Cinque Terre, Italia

Cinque Terre sits right on the gorgeous coast of the Italian riviera in Northern Italy.

It's made up on the 5 villages: Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore. 

We stayed in the cute little village of Manarola which we loved!

The vibrant colors were my favorite. 

Whoever thought to paint all of these homes different colors could really see the bigger picture.

This is a very Catholic region so many of the homes have different saints or the virgin Mary outside their door with fresh flowers - making it even more colorful.

This was our first taste of Italy and we didn't waste any time trying all of the amazing food this area had to offer!

Focaccia bread sandwiches. As all sandwiches should be made. 

All I can say is thank goodness for the caprese combo of tomato, mozzarella and basil.

That combo is how a vegetarian survives Italy!

Amazing pasta! Probably the best pasta I've ever had was enjoyed at this restaurant in Cinque. 

All of the ingredients tasted so fresh!

And of course we had our fair share of pizza. 

Not only was it delish, but it also happens to be really inexpensive. 

So pizza everyday it was!

Then there's gelato.

This was especially a favorite of Derek's. 

I'm actually not a huge fan of ice cream (I know, weird right??) so gelato wasn't my favorite dessert ever.

But it was still yummy and so fun to try lots of different flavors!

The lemon slushies were much more up my alley than gelato.

Lemons are grown all over Cinque Terre, so you know they aren't flavoring these with the artificial stuff!

So delicious and refreshing in the warm Italian sun.

One of my favorite nights was spent on these steps right on the water.

We ate gelato and watched the sun set.

There are times when - if you are up for it - you can hike along the coast to every town.

Unfortunately this was not one of those times since some of the trails had been damaged due to flooding,

but we were still able to do an incredible hike from Manarola to Corniglia and just took a quick train ride to all of the other villages.

Sunsets here were really just the best.

I can't think of a better way we could've kicked off our time in Italy.