Day 7- Montepulciano and Cinque Terre, sort of

We left Orvieto early and drove to Montepulciano, which is famous for their wine- Rosso di Montepulciano. It is a small, old town in the middle of Tuscany that sits on the top of a hill. Awesome! We had to park below and walk all the way up to the main square to hit the Cantina Contucci, which is a Rick pick and famous for their vino. We sampled other wines on our way up the hill, and the Contucci did have the best. Either that or, by the time we got up there, it just tasted the best. =) There is no reason to go to this town unless you like wine, and since we do, it was worth a stop.

After Montepulciano we headed for the coast. This is the real downer of our trip. Hadleigh struggled in the car, so we arrived on the coast at about 6pm. We were trying to go to Cinque Terre, which is an Italian National Park. They are really hard to get to by car, it is like driving on the PCH toward San Francisco times 20. Little tiny roads, hardly wide enough for one car let alone two, massive drop offs. Of course we drive into Riomaggiore, Hadleigh is screaming and I am trying not to vomit between being motion sick and afraid of rolling down the cliffs. When we pulled into the town it was 19 euro a day to park. Hmmm…not going to happen. So we drove back up the mountain and down into Vernazza where it is only 11 euro a day to park. We pulled in at 7.30pm and of course don’t have reservations because it is a Thursday in May, who needs reservations? Well the place is packed out, no rooms to be found anywhere, and I swear we asked everyone.

So Hadleigh is hungry, so we walk back to the car in silence, because I am fuming. I feed Hadleigh while Dave does the European thing “the world is my urinal”. Once I finish with Hadleigh I realize that I too must use the bathroom. So Dave opens the car door to block me from being seen…and being the expert squatter that I am, I proceed to pee all over myself. Great! We head out of Vernazza to the closest town which is a dump of a town- La Spezia. And every room in that town is booked too. We start driving out of town and stop at the last hotel we see and Dave manages to snag the last room in the hotel, the one with the bathroom down the hall. Hey…whatever works, right.

I am still angry, but manage to calm down and try not to be the selfish brat that I want to be. I just wanted to sit on the beach for 3 days, is that too much to ask. We decided that in the morning we would call hotels along the coast and see what we could find. Good plan.