Call if you're going to be late...

Today's travel tip is that if you're going to arrive at a location after dark, to make sure that the hostel/guesthouse/hotel knows exactly what time you're going to arrive. This lesson was learned the hard way in a cute little town I had heard about in Italy - Cinqueterre.

I heard about this collection of 5 little towns through recommendations of other travelers - but little did I know that the tourists nearly outnumbered the locals and that every room is booked every night. I made reservation online and when my friend and I arrived around 9pm, we found that the place was locked and the owner was nowhere to be found. Finally we reached him by phone and he said that he gave the room away because he thought we weren't showing up. Wasn't an online confirmation enough? With no room, we wandered town trying to find another place and ran into friends that we knew from college who were staying in the SAME GUESTHOUSE that we had booked and they offered to let us in and sleep on the floor. While tempted after learning there were no free rooms in town, we ended up cruising to a huge apartment owned by the guesthouse in the town of La Spezia a train stop away and spent the night there before returning the next night for a room in the town.

This town is adorable and set overlooking the ocean. When we were there it rained most of the time - but that didn't damper our spirits or plans. We still managed to eat our daily quota of pizza and gelato while there. We took a hike along the coast to visit all 5 little towns - though we still agreed that our small town of Riomaggiore was the best. We spent late nights visiting with other travelers in the local bars and we laid out on the huge boulders trying to sunbathe when the clouds broke. All in all, I recommend this as a stop, relax and eat - just don't come into town too late... or my mom always says - call if you're going to be late...