Cinque Terre and cruise ship schedules

"My question is do the ships in Livorno also bring in their passengers for day trips to the Cinque Terre?"

Sometimes, but the main day trips for cruisers from Livorno are Florence and Pisa.

Tess,

The answer may depend on which excursion options are chosen by passengers. The Cinque Terre is likely one of the options offered on ships that dock in Livorno. I would expect that the number of cruise ship day trippers will be decreasing in October, so you may not have to much of a problem. As you plan on spending one day exploring outside the five towns, you shouldn't have any problems with cruise hordes on that day.

Which of the five towns will you be staying in?

Ken,

We will be in Monterosso. Of the two full days there, there is one ship docked in La Spezia on the first day and none on the next day. However, Livorno will have 4 on the same day! So that may be the day we go to either Portofino/SML or Portovenere (still deciding between the two).

Harold, thank you. That's good to know as there are less ships from La Spezia

This doesn't have to do with cruise ship schedules, and you may have already read this advice, but wanted to let you know that we were there last Oct 5-8 (stayed in Vernazza). When we were on the train from our flight to Pisa, I was very concerned as we were packed in like sardines. But we absolutely loved our time there and would go again (although probably not in the summer). We spent some time in Manarola, and when we walked away from the harbor taking RS's self walk, there were hardly any people and it was breathtakingly beautiful. Our other full day we spent some time in Monterosso, hiked back to Vernazza, and also took the walk past the train station that afternoon for beautiful views. Mornings and evenings were delightful and we met some wonderful people. Enjoy your time there!

Debbie, so glad to hear you had a great experience. We have tried not to let other comments that warn of overcrowding and disappointing experiences discourage us. I believe it's all managing expectations. We're looking forward to it!