Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The Town:
Before the 12th century, pirates made the coast uninhabitable, so the first
Vernazzans lived in the hills above (near the Reggio Sanctuary). The town itself—and its
towers, fortified walls, and hillside terracing—are mostly from the 12th through the 15th
centuries, when Vernazza was allied with the Republic of Genoa.
Vernazza has two halves.
Sciuiu
(Vernazzan dialect for “flowery”) is the sunny side on
the left, and
luvegu
(dank) is the shady side on the right. Houses below the castle were con-
nected by an interior arcade—ideal for fleeing attacks. The “Ligurian pastel” colors are reg-
ulated by a commissioner of good taste in the regional government. The square before you
is locally famous for some of the area's finest restaurants. The big red central house—on the
site where Genoan warships were built in the 12th century—used to be a guardhouse.
In the Middle Ages, there was no beach or square. The water went right up to the build-
ings, where boats would tie up, Venetian-style. Imagine what Vernazza looked like in those
days, when it was the biggest and richest of the Cinque Terre towns. Buildings had a water
gate (facing today's square) and a front door on the higher inland side. There was no pas-
tel plaster—just fine stonework (traces of which survive above the Trattoria del Capitano).
Apartfromtheaddedplaster,thegeneralshapeandsizeofthetownhaschangedlittleinfive
centuries. Survey the windows and notice inhabitants quietly gazing back.
While the town has 1,500 residents in summer, only 500 stay here through the winter.
Vernazza has accommodations for about 500 tourists.
Above the Town:
The small, round tower above the red guardhouse—another part of
the city fortifications—reminds us of the town's importance in the Middle Ages. Back
then, its key ally Genoa's enemies (i.e., the other maritime republics, especially Pisa) were
Vernazza's enemies. Franco's Ristorante and Bar la Torre, just behind the tower, welcomes
hikerswhoarefinishing,starting,orsimplycontemplatingtheCorniglia-Vernazzahike,with
great town views. That tower recalls a time when the entire town was fortified by a stone
wall.
Vineyards fill the mountainside beyond the town. Notice the many terraces.
Someone—probably after too much of that local wine—calculated that the roughly 3,000
miles of dry-stone walls built to terrace the region's vineyards have the same amount of
stonework as the Great Wall of China.
For six centuries, the economy was based on wine and olive oil. Then came the
1980s—and the tourists. Locals turned to tourism to make a living, and stopped tending the
land. Many vineyards were abandoned, and the terraces fell into disrepair. But it's the stone-
work of the terracing in the surrounding hills that helps prevent flooding—a lesson learned
in the worst possible way on October 25, 2011.
Althoughmanylocalsstillmaintaintheirtinyplotsandproudlyservetheirfamilywines,
the patchwork of local vineyards is atomized and complex because of inheritance traditions.
Historically, families divided their land between their children. Parents wanted each child to
