La Spezia and its surroundings have many hiking opportunities. Some of the most appreciated trails are those for hiking in the Cinque Terre. The villages of this beautiful area are connected to each other with an intricate net of paths and trails connecting them one to the other, or leading from the steep hills to the sea. These were conceived in the past centuries to allow commuting and wine grapes farming as well as ensure an escape up to the hills, in times of attacks from invaders coming from the sea.
Nowadays, they serve as a tourist attraction for the stunning sea and landscape view they offer to hikers and are part of the Cinque Terre Natural Park, with very different levels of difficulty and lengths: while some of them are just a nice half an hour walk, others can be quite tough.
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There is a train ticket to get to all Cinque Terre villages you can buy at La Spezia railway station, allowing access to the Cinque Terre Park trails, but it should be noted that tourists who buy this ticket are not always advised that some of the paths in the area have been unfortunately swept away by the terrible floods that affected La Spezia surroundings in 2011. Some trails that you can still see in the maps have disappeared, others have been closed for security reasons. In some cases, they have been unofficially re-opened by locals and tourists, and you are not requested a ticket for those. Usually, these are pretty safe, as they have been cleaned up by people who walk them.
If you wish to walk in the Cinque Terre, you should previously ask what trails are open at the time of your visit.
