Da Baranin, Manarola Italy | Reader Recommendation
From June 16 until July 8 we spend our holiday at Manarola. We stayed at DA BARANIN a lovely place to stay, run by the family. You can either choose the apartment (clean, bed/shower/TV, good rooms) with apartment with bed and breakfast. Because it is not very common to stay there for 14 days we came almost part of the village. The Cinque Terre is a great place to spend the holidays, there is nature, there is the sea, there is the food and even there are some quiet moments. But then you should not go to Riomaggiore as that town is flooded with college kids. I think the American college kids are like the Germans: loud and very present. I cannot imagine that they enjoy Italy in 2 days.
The food in Manarola is very good. We enjoyed our dinners at IL PORTICCIOLO and TRATTORIA DA BILLY, and it would be nice that for once and for all the tourists are now learning to eat like the Italians: first AND second dish. There is more to enjoy than the old fashioned lasagna, ravioli or spaghetti. Which in fact, is not feeding you at all, when you only eat the pasta.
It’s funny that this great area is not very well known to the Dutch!
I recommend it !
Gerard de Bruijn
Editor’s Note: I agree with Gerard, an Italian meal consists of a first and a second course. The first course, such as spaghetti, is not a meal in its self. I witnessed some tourist complaining about this, they had not understood that a second course, such as fish or meat, should follow.
John Vittoe Notes: Italians seem to order a lot of food and this thing about two or more courses is okay for dinner but some of the restaurants and trattorias in Italy get really upset when you want to sit down and have a salad and pasta with no meat for lunch. They should take a clue from the tavernas in Greece where you can sit and eat what you want, even if it’s only a salad. In Greece, they are just glad to have someone sit down and make the place look busy so others will come. It Italy it appears that they would rather have the place empty than to have someone just order pasta. Some people don’t like a big lunch and will not order one just to please the restaurant. My wife will sometimes only want a salad for lunch and they look at her as if she was asking them to roast and serve their first born son.