Vania Clem

So yes, the views. The views are, in a word, spellbinding. There’s one terrace perched out over the sea, another off the kitchen with a table and loungers set up to watch the sun set over Vernazza, and another one besides. And windows galore! Light fills and pools every corner of this home (though there are shutters if you’d like less of it to wake you in the morning).

I found Carattino 12 in Vernazza by a sheer stroke of luck and want to extend that luck to you (especially because if you book direct, you’ll get the best price). Even though the Airbnb photos and reviews were uniformly excellent, they still didn’t prepare me for the astonishment as I crested the stairs to greet a glass door, propped open to welcome sea breezes wafting over crystalline waters. Nudged by my children to move on already, I turned and stopped again, this time stalled at the view of a flower-filled terrace, with the tumble of Vernazza’s colors beyond.

If you scroll through my website, you’ll notice I rarely recommend specific apartments. I do for Spello, mostly because so many people ask me where to stay in Spello, I figured I might as well put all my recommendations in one easy to access place. Other than that, I figure you can probably search Booking or AirBnb as well as I can. But our home in Cinque Terre added a surprising element of grace and beauty to our time there, so I had to tell you about it (you can read about my four days in Cinque Terre here, and you can also check out my Instagram stories under “Cinque Terre”).

Cinque Terre has a lot to love