Cinque Terre

I will never get over this coast. Five villages pinned to a cliff face with no road between them, and behind them something close to seven thousand kilometres of dry-stone wall, built by hand, holding up terraces of vines that people have farmed above the sea for a thousand years. You come for the colours and you leave thinking about the walls.

Here is something worth knowing before you go: the UNESCO listing is wider than most people realise. It is Portovenere, Cinque Terre and the Islands, and Portovenere comes first in the name for good reason – it is arguably the loveliest of the lot, and almost nobody books it. That is the first of several small adjustments that turn this from a day everyone has into a few days that feel like yours.

So let me give you the whole thing: where I would put you, how I would move you around, and the hours when these villages are at their most ridiculous.