It can be stifling with tourists in midsummer, but love is in the air in five villages of Italy’s Cinque Terre, where a coastal path along the Ligurian Riviera famous as a rendezvous spot for courting couples has reopened after nearly 12 years of closure.
The “Path of Love”, carved into steep cliffs between the villages of Riomaggiore and Manarola, had been closed since it was damaged by a landslide in September 2012, injuring four Australian tourists.
It will reopen to residents on Saturday and to tourists from August 9.
Although the paved path is only about 900 metres long, it offers breathtaking views of the rugged coast and is perhaps the most popular of the 48 trails that pass through the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Cinque Terre villages.
The restoration was also a labour of love, costing €22 million and including the construction of a system of steel harnesses and netting to secure the rocks above and below the walkway.
“Everyone here has been looking forward to its reopening,” said Fabrizia Pecunia, mayor of Riomaggiore and Manarola. “This road has always been important to us. After all the hard work, it gives us great satisfaction.”
Fabrizia Pecunia, Mayor of Riomaggiore and Manarola, speaking on the reopened road. Photo: Roberto Salomone/Roberto Salomone/The Observer
But Pecunia acknowledges that ahead of the reopening there were concerns about the impact that overblown romanticised imagery would have on popular spots already struggling with overcrowding.
Before it was closed, more than 850,000 visitors trekked the trail each year, many of whom carved their names or messages of love into the cliff walls.
The ritual was tolerated back in 2011, before Instagram tourism took hold. Last year, the site attracted a record four million visitors.
The newly restored Way of Love has restrictions. Not only is graffiti banned on the walls, but visitors must pay a fee to walk the path until at least 7pm. The path can be accessed by purchasing a one-day Cinque Terre Card, which gives you access to all footpaths for an extra €10 on top of the regular fare of €7.50, with an extra €15 at peak times. Timed guided tours run every 15 minutes in groups of no more than 10 people.
Pecunia said the guide aims to give walkers a better knowledge of the trails and awareness of Cinque Terre and its communities, which also include Monterosso, Vernazza and Corniglia.
Before the construction of a railway linking the five villages in 1874, travel from one village to the other required climbing steep mountains. The sea was a frequent target for pirate attacks, and few people traveled by boat. As a result, there was little interaction between the Cinque Terre communities.
Tourists in Riomaggiore. Four million people visited Cinque Terre last year, concentrated within a one-kilometre radius. Photo: Roberto Salomone/Roberto Salomone/Observer
The original idea for Love Trail had nothing to do with love at all: a rudimentary path was created during the 1920s when a second rail line was blown up, allowing workers to transport materials and to create a warehouse for storing explosives.
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But enthusiastic residents of Riomaggiore and Manarola saw an opportunity to extend the road between the two towns and helped build it, many of them working for free, including Pecunia’s grandfather. They named the road Strada Nuova (New Road).
The road was closed during World War II, but after it reopened it became a popular meeting point for lovers from the two villages.
The road was renamed “Via da Love” after someone wrote the words in chalk on the door of a former gunpowder storehouse. The writing was discovered by Paolo Monelli, a reporter for Corriere della Sera who was on holiday in the Cinque Terre and wrote an article calling on local authorities to rename the road.
“The Trail of Love was built by our ancestors to connect the two communities,” Pecunia said. “It’s a great achievement and for us it symbolizes the strength and determination of the people here.”
The €22 million path uses steel harnesses and nets to secure the rocks above and below it. Photo: Roberto Salomone/Roberto Salomone/Observer
Ligurian authorities and the Italian Tourist Board were keen to capitalise on romanticism in their promotional efforts, putting up placards at the road’s entrances depicting Venus, the Roman goddess of love, as an influencer, but a suggestion to run a “longest kiss” contest was flatly rejected by Pecunia, who said it could lead to an even bigger surge in tourists simply visiting to clean up their social media profiles.
“I would never want to do it again,” she said. “Via dell’Amour is a beautiful place, but we are working with the national park to give it a more authentic image. I’m sure that in the future we can promote it in a way that will raise awareness.”
