Italy: Moneglia

Italy was on our short list of countries to visit before we move back to the US this summer. James has never been, and Daphne was only there in utero when Pete and I visited on a church choir trip in 2005. So for the week of mid-term/Pentecost school break in May, we drove down through France and Switzerland and all the way to the Italian coast near Genoa. 

Side note: to tell a friend or family member back in the US that you're driving to Italy for the week makes you feel a bit sheepish. It sounds exotic, fancy, indulgent, spoiled, bragging, etc. However, to tell a fellow Luxembourg resident also makes you feel a bit sheepish but for a completely different reason. You know they're thinking, "So you've been here four years and you're just now getting around to that, eh? Poor you!" Well, either way, and especially now that our time here is limited, rest assured we're not taking these privileges for granted! 

Anyway, our destination was the small town of Moneglia, only because we'd found an inexpensive Airbnb overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

Moneglia

We absolutely loved the place we stayed, although the finding it for the first time in the dark proved difficult.  To get from one end of Moneglia to the other, you must navigate through a system of narrow, one-way tunnels (galleria) that are set on a traffic signal system that alternates several times an hour for each direction.

When will this one end? Are we driving fast enough to make it out in time??

Our turnoff was between two tunnels on the far end of town. This also meant that each time we wanted to walk into town or back to our place, we had to get the timing just right and then make a run for it. Technically you're not supposed to walk through these but people do it anyway.

made it!

But it was all worth it for the amazing spot!

we had the bottom floor of this villa, our host was upstairs

The view!

not bad for 80 Euros per night!

climbing the steps

one big storm came through, which was cool!

rocky area directly below apartment

Here are a few shots of the inside of the flat, stollen from the Airbnb page:

kids slept on the sofa bed

Moneglia itself was a great little village, separated away from the crazy tourist bustle of the famous Cinque Terre, which we visited later in the week (post forthcoming). I suppose the town proper is a bit boring, which fortunately is just right for us Ts. Best of all, there was a sandy and sheltered beach in town - quite rare along this rockier section of Italian coastline.

here you can see the beach from our hike on the opposite side of the bay from where we stayed

Daphne and Pete made it to to the top!

We spent most of our week at the apartment or at the beach, so here are a bunch more beachy photos!

The kids played in a mixture of Luxembourgish and American English, which I'm sure confused the heck out of the Germans, French, and Italians on the beach.

improvised volleyball net

awww

And here are a few more non-beachy shots from around town:

Well, we give five stars to Moneglia, and bonus points for its general lack of other Americans or mass groups of tourists.  Maybe they all come in the summer and we just got lucky.