Where should we stay while visiting Cinque Terre?

The Cinque Terre is small enough that you can pick one place to stay and travel easily between the 5 towns. Vernazza seems to be the most popular town. Monterosso is the largest. You might get better values in Manarola or Riomaggiore. The towns are literally minutes apart by train. Be sure to have valid tickets so that you can just hop on and off where you want. The is a Cinque Terre Treno card that can be purchased in 1, 2, 3 & 7-day cards. This card provides unlimited travel on the train between La Spezia in the south to Levanto in the north. Plus, it covers the fares on the 4 coastal trails (yes there are ticket booths there). You can get these cards at any TI office. They will also provide you a map of all hiking trails in the area.

As a side note, a lot of luck trying to find a place in the CT in July for around $50. Not likely. Also, you should be booked by now for any place in the CT for July. It's mobbed in July.

Hi Amy,

I would strongly recommend that you stay in the Cinque Terre. It is a great idea to stay in one of the towns and travel around - the other four towns can be easily reached by train, boat, or by hiking along the beautiful (but sometimes difficult) trails.

Your price range is fine - I had a great place to stay in Riomaggiore thanks to Mar Mar rental agency. They are an agency that rents out private apartments in Riomaggiore, and they employ the cleaning staff.

Just go to their website, under the "contact us" section is an accommodation request form. Fill out the dates you will be there, and they will respond with a list of what is available, an honest description, and the price.

Have a great trip!

Awesome thanks! Everything I have found has been less than $50 each throughought Europe. (Scotland, London, Paris, Nice, Rome, Venice, and Florence) so I didnt think that would be too little to expect to pay there. How much do the train passes run and/or is there a website I can do it on before we head out?

I am not aware that you can buy the CT Treno cards online. You can walk into any Tourist Information (TI) office in the CT, Levanto or La Spezia and buy them. Its not difficult. There's a TI in the La Spezia train station. We bought ours there.

Does anyone know the costs of the passes?

amy,

Travel during July in the C.T. is most likely going to be BUSY! I'd suggest pre-booking accommodations straight away, as July is not that far away.

As Larry said it might be a bit "challenging" to find accommodations in the C.T. for US$50 a night at that time of the year. If you want inexpensive lodgings, your best bet would be the Ostello 5 Terre in Manarola. It's clean and well run, but is very restrictive in some ways in terms of lockouts during the day, etc.

I'd also recommend Mar Mar Rooms in Riomaggiore. In addition to private rooms, they operate somewhat of a Hostel at fairly reasonable rates. One caveat is that you'll need to time your arrival prior to 17:00, as that's when they close for dinner.

I believe it's best to use one of the villages for a "home base" and then tour the area from there. It's a fairly small area, so it's hardly worth the trouble to pack up and move to a different village (especially when the train is so convenient). Each of the villages has their own "personality", so you might want to read the description in the Guidebooks to see which sounds most suitable. Corniglia is somewaht "remote" so not quite as popular (it's on top of a bluff, so not as easy to get to). For smaller and somewhat informal, Riomaggiore or Manarola would be good.

Note that you'll need a C.T. Park Pass to hike the trails. As I recall you can buy this either with or without a train pass. Check the Italy Guidebook for Rick's analysis on which version is the better value. There will be staff in small booths checking to make sure hikers have a valid pass!

Don't bother pre-ordering the Pass, as it's very easy to buy at any of the train stations or T.I.'s in the area. I believe the Pass must be validated similar to a rail ticket. Don't validate until just before you start using it, so that you get the maximum time.

Happy travels!

Thanks! The mar mar and the other CT hostel are only $30 USD a night! Great!!

I'm hesistant to pass this information on, as I like to think of it as my hidden secret since there's not much information out there, but I rented an apartment in Riomaggiore a couple weeks ago, and it was wonderful. It was the top level (which mean 102 steep steps up from the main road), but the view from the private terrace was nice.

The owners don't speak much english, but enough to get by:

It's owned by Roberta Veneziani & Claudio Follegot
www.cinqueterre-camera.com

Or you can send me a message & I can send you their e-mail address.

They'll provide videos of their places. (I stayed in Arancia)

Hi Amy,

We just got back from Italy a couple days ago and stayed in Riomaggiore with Edi's rooms (www.wel.it/Vesignaedi) and it was wonderful. If I went back I would stay in the exact same place. The room we had was 80EUR a night but it had a terrace overlooking the ocean and town. I know they have many more rooms that are probably less. I would definitely though recommend staying in Riomaggiore. It's beautiful there and not as touristy as Vernazza. Plus they have a great bar hangout at night...Bar Centrale which make a great homemade mojito!

Have fun! You'll love it there! :-)

I recently returned from CT. I had to make reservations at Ospitalia del Mare Hostel in Levanto (one town north). I was deeply disappointed before arriving because I really wanted to stay IN the CT either at Manarola or Monterosso but they were fully booked. Well, I couldn't have been more thrilled when I got to Levanto. I ended up loving it more than the CT towns. It has an amazing boardwalk and sandy beach. The town has many great restaurants and is great to walk around in, the prices are more reasonable than the CT. The hostel, which offers private rooms, was perfectly clean and neat, open, airy and extremely comfortable. The breakfast was included and DELICIOUS. It was 20E per person, per night - unbeatable! There was a beautiful terrace and laundry facilities. It was quite easy to get to the other CT towns by train, which was frequent - we never had to wait.

Does anyone have a "secret" little place to stay in Portovenere a couple of nights in Nov instead of one of the hotels?

Melissa, what was the name of the hostel and did it have a "lock out time" during the day or at night?
While travelling in Germany, my husband and I stayed in a Pensione and we were "locked in" until 0600 and that drove me crazy in the mornings because I am an early riser.

There was no lock out/lock in and no curfew. We got up around 5 am everyday and usually didn't return until midnight or later. You get keys to the gate, door and your room door.

Hello everybody, just want to invite you and your readers to our site about the cinque terre and to the blog where you can also vote the nicest of the 5 Terre.
Also online a section about Video of the Cinque Terre, a different point of view..