On our last full day in the Cinque Terra/ Ligourian Region it was Debbie's interest to visit the caves of Carrera where Michaelangello went to select his marble for his statues and sculptures. Since the Roman times when slaves cut the marble and rolled huge stones down the mountains to build the Roman Forum and Michelangelo used a block of the marble to carve his David, the mines have been a rich resource for generations. HOWEVER, Debbie's interest is apparently not shared by throngs of tourists. Yes, there are caves. Lots of caves and lots of mines up in the Italian Alps. We were little prepared to take the trains and buses that were required to make our way up into the mountains to "visit" the Carrera mines and take a tour as advertised in some of the travelers' guides. For starters, everyone wanted to know (in Italian) WHERE we wanted to go. That seemed like a reasonable question and we tried to explain that we wanted to see THE Carrera marble mine. It turns out there are thousands of mines and saying we wanted to see the marble mines was like saying we wanted to see New York City. The mines and the mountains are hardly something one "visits"!
With the help of 3 Italian men and a Japanese lady that spoke English and Italian we were directed toward an 8-passenger bus that took us up a one-lane road to a village with a population of 300. The views were good but, of course, at a distance because there are so #*@;% BIG!
It turned out the reason why they recommended this village is because it is very, very popular with the Italians for the special way they prepare and serve lard for the pigs. There were pig signs everywhere and, apparently, the EU has tried to shut them down for violating food processing protocols. However, they just pay the fines and keep on serving this delicacy to the many folks that flock up here every weekend.
We were rather discouraged after it took us three hours to get somewhere that really wasn't our final destination. The bus down operates irregularly and we were stuck up there for two hours. The marble "museum" was closed along with the Tourist Information Office in town. We headed back to Manarola for our final family dinner together before taking separate paths tomorrow out of the Cinque Terra.
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