Carrara marble and reaching the Cinque Terre

Last time we were in Italy we drove by the hills were Carrara marble is mined. Since this is the deep dive Italy trip, we stopped. We saw how it is extracted, learned that above 2000 meter elevation is now protected, and saw some carving. 
In the town of Carrera at the base of the mountains, even the curbs are marble!
After this fascinating side trip, we went up to the cinque terre. Here we take a vacation from out vacation, as tomorrow we have totally free! We're staying in Levanto, directly North of the 5 towns. We took a boat thru all 5 towns, so got great views of the entire coast.


Now we're settled in to our Levanto hotel, which as a second story corner balcony...just perfect from which to drink our limoncino (as it's called here) and people watch from above, like the somewhat introverts we really are in this very extroverted culture!

We're getting ready for our group dinner, which I'm pretty sure is going to be amazing given the abundence of seafood here!