There used to be over 60, and they kept the rich owners safe from marauding and feuding villagers. This town was very picturesque, but also pretty touristy, full of trinket shops and tourists. Still, we managed to have a nice simple lunch - a wild boar prochiotto sandwich for Rich, and vegetable bruschetta for Kat, with the local white wine. 
Then the final stretch to La Spezia, where we parked the car for free, and hopped the train to our Cinque Terre destination town of Vernazza. The Cinque Terre is a region of five hillside towns on the northern Mediterranean coast (Vernazza is #4 of 5). It's more rustic then the Amalfi coast towns, and though occupied with many American tourists, they are more the backpacker type, and not the cruise ship/tour bus crowd we ran into further south. Our room is 63 steps up from
street level (Kat got lucky and the owner of our Italian rental room carried her bag up all the flights of stairs....Rich wasn't so lucky with his bag!). The harbor is steps away, and we've had a pleasant evening getting to know the town.
This is the birthplace of pesto, and Kat had that for dinner, while Rich experienced some stuffed mussels and fried cod cakes. Food is as regional as was predicted by our pre-trip reading. Once you leave Tuscany, you leave the wild boar behind and enter seafood territory.
The Cinque Terre is a destination for it's coastal hiking, and that is the plan for tomorrow. It was some delicious gelato for dessert (Pesce and Coco for Kat...Peach and Coconut, and Lampone and Ananas for Rich...Strawberry and Pineapple), and
then the writing of this, and now we're planning to rest up for the long hike tomorrow.
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