beauty, beauty everywhere

spending a month in europe is, among other things, confirmation that there are so many amazingly gorgeous places in the world. and i've only seen about 0.1% of them.

this is the one i'm appreciating the most today, as i'm downloading the 482 pictures we took:



cinque terre ("five earths") - five little villages along the north western coast of italy. we arrived by train in the second most southerly town, manarola, and proceeded to walk up hill for an hour to volastra, where our little b&b awaited us...with this terrace view:



after an 8 hour train ride from geneva, we stood standing with our packs on at the base of the hill, sweating wildly in the mediterranean sun. a local man walked by wearing only red swimming trunks and flip flops. between his non-english and our non-italian, we established that yes, our town (volastra) was up the hill and he would show us the way...through terraced vineyards, along crumbling rock walls, up, up, up. we walked for an hour up that hill. i cursed in every language i could muster...under my breath, of course, and tried to remain cheerful by practicing my three italian conversational phrases...which was more confusing for our friend than when i spoke in english. so we made it to the top, after being passed by the free shuttle going up and back (ahem). and my dear lovely r, well, she looked at my red face, sweat molding my t-shirt to every curve of my torso, and she said with a smile, "isn't this fun?!"

i almost decked her, but in the end, it was fun. or at least made for a memorable experience and a little more strength in my desk-job depleted leg muscles.

that was our first day in italy.