6. Portovenere (and a bit of La Spezia)

Hello World!

It's Friday so it's also a perfect time for a new post.

We're still staying in Italy, August 2019. Once we visited the Cinque Terre, we still had other places to see. One of them was Portovenere, which is considered to be part of the Cinque Terre, even though it, technically, is not. If you look on the map, they are quite far from each other (a bit over 30 kilometres) but you'll soon see that they are very similar in style.

My parents visited this town one year earlier and they wanted me to see it, too. As it turned out, we were in for a treat, but we'll get to this point a bit later.

The plan was to leave our car in La Spezia and take a bus to Portovenere - which is a much better option as La Spezia is much bigger so it's also much easier to find a parking spot. A bus to Portovenere is not very expensive (around 3€ for a one-way ticket) and it takes 30 minutes, more or less, to get to your destination. One tip: if you decide to use this option, make sure to buy a ticket in a tobacco kiosk (Tabaccheria) or any shop that sells tickets - Google Maps is surprisingly helpful here, as many of the shops are actually closed for even several weeks during the summer months.

La Spezia, by the way, is a very interesting city, with a port that harbours both, luxurious yachts and military vessels. Many buildings on our way were military as well, so, you can feel safe there, that's for sure. You can also notice quite easily that it is a bigger city - the streets are wider than in the tiny villages by the sea, but they still have this "mediterranean" character (just check the orange trees growing right next to the street).

By the way - the sun was so strong that I got sunburn (wearing a tank top) and looked like a typical Karen for the rest of the trip.

Now, Portovenere. It has those colourful buildings, just like any of the villages of the Cinque Terre had. But, one, it's bigger, two, here you'll see some X-XII century buildings here. Also, it is known for the Byron's Grotto - the whole region is known as 'Poets Gulf', but Lord Byron loved this specific town the most. Go have a read about it, if you want to know more!

What we did not realise, until we got there, was that it was a special day commemorating the Miracle of the White Madonna, the patron saint of Portovenere.

At first we noticed that there are quite many lanterns and candles all around the city so we started digging in the Internet and found out what is going to happen in the evening. It was an absolute pleasure for the eyes (and a lens) BUT because of the procession all the buses were suspended so we had to wait for an hour in a line full of people to get back to La Spezia. This was a drawback and I suggest you take this into consideration if you want to visit Portovenere on 17th August. Anyway, here are some pictures that will show you what made my photography-devoted part of the heart flutter.

My dear friend, Navya, said that the photo with all the candles lit on the hill looked like straight from a Disney movie - it kind of has the princess-y vibe to it, doesn't it?

That's all for today! I'd love to hear your opinions in the comments section at the very bottom of this page!

Till next time!

M.