Portovenere

We gave trains the flick today and had a relaxing day on a boat trip to portovenere which is just south of the cinque terre near la spezia. It was an amazing place to enter by boat as there was a huge church built on what was a roman fortress(photo), and then the rows of colourful narrow houses like cinque terre(photo). We had some hours to kill at portovenere so we walked up a shady allyway sampled some genovese pesto saw some pasta shaped like huge plate and rolled into a tube...weird.(photo)We then went to the church fortress and looked inside, climbed to the top for a view and looked down the other side into a sort of blue grotto. Nice! wandered into another church which had amzing accoustics so because we were by ourselves Lyndie did her best rendition of the hallelujah chorus until we realised others had also come in. We found an art exhibition . The artists work is not dissimilar to the works I have just put into the Graydon Gallery in the city exhbition.ie Loose dribbly textured cityscapes. We then went to the square and found a shady spot for some packed lunch and a gelati. We caught the boat back stopping off at Monterosse for a swim with the thousands as it was VERY HOT TODAY!!! back home for tea and biccies on the balcony (photo)