Santa Margharita, Italy

The second port on our cruise was Santa Marghartia, Italy (close to Portofino). Here we met up with Derek's cousin, Luke Wagner in a town called Rio Maggiere which is part of Cinque Terre (pronounced chin-qua tear ay and means 5 lands). The five villages are old fishing villages that are about 4-5 miles apart but are connected by steep staircases and narrow pathways that are as old as the villages (dating back to the 1100s). Mike and Robin Bratton and their son Joey and daughter-in-law Amanda joined us for this day. Rio Maggiere was the furthest village and was 1.5 hours by train. Once we got there, we found that the trail connecting is to the next village was closed due to rock slide. We walked around the town and ate some Italian cheese and sausage and had some pesto pizza that the area is famous for. We then took the train to another village called Montague and proceeded on our hike from Monterosso to Vernazza. The stairs were very steep and very long. About 370 on the way up and then again on the way down. It was quite a hike but the trail is all along the coastline (which is a top a cliff) so the higher you went, the better the views.

Rio Maggiere

A little over half way up.... Keep on climbing!

Joey and Amanda Bratton, me and Robin Bratton

More stairs to climb... Luke Wagner, Derek and Mike Bratton.

I think this was looking back on the town of Monterosso

Looking down on the village Vernazza

Is anybody home?

 When we were almost to Vernazza, there was an accordion player nestled in the hill serenading us. If anyone is looking for a money-making business venture, selling water along those paths would be quite profitable! It was HOT! Once in Vernazza, we stopped at a pub type restaurant where Luke ordered a couple different appetizer type dishes and they were similar to bruschetta, caprese, and baguettes topped with meats and cheeses. The food was delicious and so were the mojitos and margaritas we ordered.

 After we finished eating, we briefly looked around the village and then caught the train. Trains in Italy are rarely on time, if they come at all. At the train station, we realized that the only train back to where our boat was that was non-stop didn't arrive until 4:17 which was a problem as the trip was 1.5 hours and we had to be all aboard at 4:30. We boarded a train that we would take as far as it would go and then hop another train to get the rest of the way to Santa Margharita. Before we came to the transfer station, we were asked for our train tickets by a ticket collector that spoke no English. We were then told that we neglected to get our tickets validated at the train station (which no one informed us we needed to do) so each person had to pay 50 Euros a piece. Our tickets were only about 5 Euros each way so we said that we would get off at the next stop to validate our ticket. Of course, the train guy spoke no English so then continued to yell at us to give him our tickets and pay the money. He had a little card that explained lack of validation "could" result in a fine but no monetary amount was listed. The next stop came and went and Derek and Robin were still involved in a heated discussion with the guy. Meanwhile, there was a young couple on their honeymoon that were seated next to us from Switzerland that were also asked to pay. Once they heard that we were not paying, the young man offered to pay the fine for us all. It was so sweet of him - young people were definitely the stars of this story.
The next station was the transfer station so I was hoping we could make it there and get off an be done with it. The train guy finally said we could pay 5 Euro rather than 50 Euro. At this point, it started to feel a little bit like extortion so Derek and Robin refused to pay at all. This really made the man upset and he demanded our documentation (passports) which we then refused to give up also. The man at this point started yelling that he was going to call the polizia if we didn't pay. I started to get very nervous as our time was already close to making it on the ship. We really couldn't afford to be detained by he police. Finally, the train guy headed up the steps to the second floor and we figured we would get off the train and avoid the whole situation. We got off at the transfer station and headed to the bulletin board with the train map and times to see when our train would be arriving.
When we got there we turned around to find that the train guy had followed us off the train and had recruited another train worker to help yell at us. Of course, he also spoke no English so we are trying to say that we purchased the tickets today and were on our way to validate them. The issue with the validation is that the train tickets are valid for a certain amount of uses within a two month period so if the tickets are not validated, you could use them more than the allotted times. Derek then said he would stay with the train people while we headed up to the platform, validated our tickets and waited for the trains.
On the train platform, I found a young (maybe 19-20) Italian kid in a blue shirt that spoke broken English. I asked him to talk to the train workers for us and translate what we were saying. The train workers followed us upstairs and meanwhile, had recruited another train worker - this one was a women. We then watched a VERY heated discussion take place between our young translator and the train workers. This discussion drew the attention of all the people on the platform and two other young Italian men got involved. We had no idea what the conversation was about but "Polizia" was mentioned a lot and it seemed the train workers were threatening to call the "polizia" on the young kids too. At one point, one of the workers sort of shoved the young kid in the blue shirt and the other young observers started to act aggressively like they were going to brawl with the train workers. We were starting to get very nervous and Derek finally asked one of the young kids listening in if we needed to just go ahead and pay. He said yes, he thought that would be best, but then he said "Wait" and he finished listening to the conversation. Then, amazingly, the train workers went down the stairs and left. We all were looking around thinking they were going to call the police but the kids said we were okay to go!!
We later found out that the argument that the young kid had posed on our behalf was that this form of extortion on tourists was detrimental to the Italian economy and Americans would not return if this happened. We went to find the main translator in blue but we couldn't find him anywhere - he had completely disappeared. We asked his friends and they said they had never seen him before - he wasn't with them as we had initially thought. My theory is that he was our guardian angel. I tried to pay the young kids for their help but they refused any money. They did agree to pose in a picture with us though! We made it onto our next train and made it back to the boat with just a few minutes to spare.
Once on the boat, we found that many people ended up paying the 50 Euro, some paid 5 Euro and some surrendered their passport information and were told they would be sent a bill for 200 Euro and would not be let into Italy again until they paid! It seems that scare tactics work pretty well on Americans!! Had we been by ourselves and not in a group of 6, I am sure we would have paid. Cinque Terre was a beautiful place to visit and I think I would like to go back and visit the villages we missed on this trip but we will definitely make sure to validate our train ticket!!

The two guys in the middle were the two Italians that joined in our argument part way through. We never saw the guy in blue again though.

If only the consequences of not validating your train ticket were as explicit as these signs of what would happen if you don't follow the rules :) Maybe the first sign is "No one-legged men allowed".... who knows.