"Best dessert of your life!!!"

"I have the menu, for the best dessert of your life." -- Il Pirata Cafe

Gianluca and Massimo at Il Pirata in Vernazza
Picture care of Il Pirata website.

We heard the above quote at least a dozen times in a matter of minutes (both to us and every other patrons of Il Pirata in Vernazza. I think we were talking to Massimo this day but as you can tell from the picture, the two look A LOT alike. What a kick they are! We had lunch here (after quite enjoying our breakfast the previous day -- mentioned here). For lunch we had Gnocchi alla Pesto e Gorgonzola. OMG delicious! Pete had a hot chocolate (the thick almost pudding variety, amazing!). For dessert, we of course had to follow the brothers advice and have "the best dessert of your life." It was a delightful panna cotta serviced with a fruit puree and lots of fresh fruit. I have to say, it was quite good.

I think I'm getting a head of my self, we actually started the day not eating lunch (although that wouldn't be unusual given how much we tend to sleep in on vacation). No, we actually started the day by hiking. The trains were back running so we could hike along the beautiful trains running between the five towns (4 trails total). One trail was out of commission due to land slide, so the brought us down to 3 trails. Once we got through trail 1 and trail 3 (trail 2 was the one down), we decided that was enough for us for one day. The trails themselves were beautiful although basically 100% stairs. Talk about butt buster! Oh well, we had a great time and the views and weather were breathtaking!

Hiking took up most of our day, so we got back and relaxed for a while on the terrace before heading down for dinner just in time for a gorgeous sunset. Having been stormy the day before, the waters were still rather rough and still some clouds on the horizon which just added to the beautiful sunset.

For dinner, we went back to Trattoria Gianni Franzi (where we ate our first night). As with the first night, it was practically perfect. We sat next to a lovely couple from Vancouver who were a delight to chat with all evening (Mary Ellen and Gil). We ended up running into them at least two more times on our trip. Wish we'd gotten their contact information. What a sweet couple!

Dinner menu:

Antipasti: Cured meats

Primi: Pasta with Pesto and another pasta with a spicy tomato sauce.

The cured meats plate was amazing. So light and very flavorful! The pesto pasta was lovely as usual but the spicy tomato pasta was the best. So addictingly good! We also had a lovely bottle of Cinque Terre Rosso (Sassarini from Montorrosso) with dinner, perfect! Dessert was affagato with Gran Marnier and Tiramisu. FAB-U-LOUS.

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