It’s lunchtime in Santa Margherita Ligure. After our bus ride that didn’t happen, we found a nice little “ristorante” that has a view of the marina. While we’re having lunch, we’re going to make a plan for the next few days. We’ll go to Cinque Terre for sure. Portofino, Chiavari, Sestri Levante, and Levanto are some other potential destinations. So much to do on the Italian Rivieria, so little time. But right now, it’s lunchtime. Mangia!
Pranzo (Lunch)
First things first – we needed to order lunch. The day’s specials were hand-written on a sign in the window. They included spaghetti con cozze, (spaghetti with mussels), and trenette al pesto. We ordered both specials.
It’s hard to go wrong ordering the specials of the day. The specials are “special” because the cook uses whatever is best to use that day. Mussels are probably a special today because one of those boats in the marina came in early this morning and unloaded some good-looking mussels.
“Trenette al Pesto” is a local specialty from nearby Genoa. Genoans have been making it for centuries. Someone in Genoa was probably having trenette al pesto for lunch the day Christopher Columbus was born there. It’s made by combining trenette, (pasta similar to linguini), potatoes, green beans, and pesto.
Liguria, (the part of Italy we’re in now), is pesto country. Basil bushes and trees that pine nuts come from love it here. Ligurians combine basil, pine nuts, garlic, salt, olive oil, and parmesan or pecorino to make pesto. Well, not just the Ligurians. But they did it first.
Focaccia!
We had just ordered when someone brought us a basket of focaccia. (“Foh-caught-cha”). Focaccia is a kind of bread that’s another local specialty. Vendors here sell just-out-of-the-oven foccacia on the sidewalk. You can smell it before you see it. Mmmmm.
They bake focaccia in sheet pans, then cut it into squares when it’s ready. It has dimples on top, so each square piece of focaccia looks like a little mattress. They like to put rosemary on it, maybe some olives inside, or maybe just sea salt on top.
Focaccia is easy to make, but as with anything, some recipes are better than others. My personal favorite is from an excellent food blog called Alexandra’s Kitchen. You wanna eat something that’s really, really good? Make this focaccia. (See mine at the top of this post). Mamma mia.
The focaccia they brought to us was warm. I’m pretty sure it had just come out of the oven. How to not stuff myself on this before the meal comes? Not easy!
We were having a fine time, sitting there in the little restaurant, watching the boats in the marina bobbing gently up and down, munching on focaccia. I’m thinking to myself, “Hey, maybe we should just do this all day. Nah…”
Time for a Walk
I had read that you can walk from Santa Margherita Ligure to Portofino. Since we were going to be stuffed after lunch, a long walk might be just the ticket. We could start walking in that direction, and if we decided it was too far, we could just get a taxi or something.
So — we decided to walk towards Portofino today, go to Cinque Terre tomorrow by train, and explore the little towns down the coast the day after that. OK – we had our plan.
The weather was perfect for walking – warm, but not too hot, with a gentle ocean breeze. We headed north on a walkway alongside a road that follows the coastline. It felt great to be out walking after that big lunch. Well, big for me, at least, since I had eaten most of the focaccia myself. I guess I’m going to have to learn how to pace myself with that stuff. (Or not!)
We walked for what seemed like just a little while, but when we turned around to see where we’d been, it looked like we’d really gone a long ways. We could see where our hotel was, but it was just a little spec now. If we’d come this far, there was certainly no turning back. We were committed. Onward!
After a while the terrain started to change. The beach we’d been walking beside narrowed until it was gone. Now we had a rocky coastline on our left and a hillside that was turning into a forest on our right.
The nice walking path we had started on was getting sketchy. The wide road we were following turned into a narrow mountain road. The water hitting the rocks below was clear blue, the way it is in Hawaii. Tall trees covered the steep hillside on the other side of the road. It was beautiful. Then the walkway abruptly ended.
To be continued…
