Cinque Terre, Italy

In Italy in the fall of 2011, my nephew, Mike Rappa, and I shared quite an adventure, an adventure that might have seen us swept away by a historic flood, had we arrived just a day earlier in Cinque Terre. We arrived it what appeared to be a heavy rainstorm. The next morning, we found out just how heavy it was.

Severe flooding  closed all roads to the four villages below Riomaggiore. No trains, no buses, no cabs and no trails. Mike and I could only walk along the highway, and through a half mile tunnel, to get to Riomaggiore. The views were stunning, as you can see, but I was disappointed, especially for Mike, that he didn't get to see the other villages, especially Vernazza, the most spectacular one, in my opinion. I posted a shot yesterday of it from my first time here.

We understood just how terrible the flooding was when we got back to the hotel and met a young Spanish couple from Barcelona, who had just survived a nightmare, twenty hours in their car not knowing if at any minute it would be swept away along with the road down the cliff into the Mediterranean. They were evacuated by helicopter. Of course the young man took a video. I had only ever seen anything like it on the news or in a disaster movie. They knew they were lucky to be alive. Five people were not so lucky.

Although I was disappointed for myself that I wasn't able to hike through the entire park and disappointed for Mike that he would not see the other villages, my disappointment was tempered by the terrifying account of the Spanish couple whose dream vacation of a week in Italy became a twenty hour nightmare come true of an ordeal that made them feel lucky to he alive.