Venice
This was now definitely my highlight of the journey (and the part that I was probably looking forward to the most).
One thing that stuck out on this trip for me was that no matter how well prepared we thought we were - we were actually not prepared at all! Example: We knew our hotel was not on the island of Venice, but on the mainland. We knew our train terminated on the island, but that it also stopped on the mainland. We did not know what that mainland stop was or how much more convenient it would have been to get off on the mainland. It kinda dawned on us as the train was pulling out of the mainland station to cross the bridge to the island that maybe it would have been a good idea to find a way to our hotel from the station we had just left...
Oh well. To be honest, it was well worth the extra about 3 hours it took us to get back to the mainland as the scene that welcomed us when we got off the train was just .. well .. breathtaking! and truly unbelievable at the same time. Below is the view from the train station.
We spent a good hour at the train station trying to get travel information to find out how to get back to the mainland again. Colin sat on the steps outside while the girls chased pigeons; made friends and generally ran amok while I stood in queues inside.
While we were sitting on the steps contemplating the next step of our journey and not wanting to move from our vantage point, we watched a gondola get hit by a speed boat taxi, knocking the poor gondola driver clean off his boat and breaking the back tail. He got out the water screaming and cursing the taxi driver. We got a picture of him while he was still dry, below.
Well, time was not waiting and the daylight so deceptively makes you think that you have still got time on your hands, so we set off to find the bus stop to get to our hotel, considering it was already pushing 8pm. Colin always has the fun task of carrying the bag - and Venice is not kind to travellers with it's multitude of steps and bridges. First bridge crossing and view of the Grand Canal below.
The next day we started with a boat trip down the Grand Canal. The bus service there operates pretty much like any other bus with coloured routes and bus stops the whole way along the canals and we sure made use of the 3 day travel pass.
Still could not get over the houses with the water lapping under the front door!
The Grand Canal is flanked the whole way with cafes and markets and LOTS of gondolas. We stopped and had a drink at one of the cafes below just so that we could use the toilet. Can you believe that the public toilets wanted to charge us 2 euros a person to use the loo!!!! Now normally I have to pay and the kids go in for free, but not in Venice! And my miserliness popped up and just would not get over paying 6 euros for a pee!
Watching the Venetian traffic, we were amazed that there weren't more crashes. There didn't seem to be any specific lanes or direction of traffic flow - or none that we could make out anyway.
And of course, everything gets done by boat - even the high speed cop chases. While we were drinking our beer at the cafe mentioned above, an ambulance came passed at high speed and totally upset the peace of the pavement, sending out a HUGE wave that came right over the bank, soaking all of our feet and bags and created much excitement amongst the cafe patrons.
The Grand Canal empties out into a large body of water, with San Marco on the left and an island on the right with the church of San Giorgio on it. The photo below is one of my favourite with everything "in motion". It was taken from San Marco looking over to San Giorgio.
San Marco is a tourist hot spot overrun with, well, tourists. And wherever there are tourists, there are the curios. Amber and Saz got to choose what they wanted. Amber a fan and Sarah a snow globe. The fan definitely became the prized choice and although Saz never said as much but the envy of the fan was plain to see (and a 2nd one was bought before the end of the stay).
The weather was unbelievably hot. The whole trip in Italy was done in high 30s. Our factor 30 has never had to work this hard. Below we are strolling through the square of San Marco and the following pics are of the basilica of San Marco
We were NOT in a tourist mood and decided to avoid the "must see" San Marco Basilicas and Palaces and moved out of the main hub to explore some of the quieter streets of San Marco. Without much attention to the map, we ambled around left and then right depending on what attracted our attention around each corner (that's the best part of being on an island - how lost can you really get anyway).
We happened upon some gondola drivers taking a load off and took the opportunity for a snap. Although I took a 2nd picture to put the flash on - I still didn't get it right, so unfortunately we can see they are gondola drivers, but really cannot see who they are...
Now, just like with the police and ambulance activities, as soon as you get off the main streets, you start to see life as normal for Venetians... Activities like building and moving house take on a whole new perspective..
We took a trip to the San Giorgio church and thoroughly enjoyed the view from the belfry over Venice..
By evening time we found a little out of the way restaurant that was apparently mainly used by locals and received the hospitality of the restaurant owner who was a one-man-show ... cook, waiter, owner, order taker, drinks pourer and boy did it show. He was constantly out of breath and looking really frazzled. But the food was excellent and the company the best.
On our last day, we did the boat trip to the island of Morano - famous for it's glass works. All the glass blowers of Venice were sent to this island to avoid any fires in Venice. It must be really hard to distinguish yourself and your shop from the rest where every store is in the same trade - and the island is really not that small! The one window really appealed to us - it even had glass flowers in the window boxes :)
As learned from the Paris and Disney Land trip, we saved the best activity for last. The LONG awaited, and MUCH asked after .... gondola ride!
Definitely one of those things that you cannot not do in Venice! We planned it to coincide with dinner and so we asked our driver to take us to one of the streets that was recommended to us as the "local" hangout - free of tourists. It was really great. Walking down the street you can hear the sounds of people at home - children being bathed; family chatter in the living rooms. We enjoyed watching all the people coming and going by their boats - young couples "cruizin" with their speakers blaring; families coming home from their shopping; old timers coming back from a day's fishing; others coming home from the beach...
And tomorrow we will be leaving :(
I am looking forward to "getting lost in Venice" again... and hopefully again...
(After Venice, there was a one night stop over at Milan. Enough to qualify for a fridge magnet, but not really enough to qualify for any conversation space or photos on this blog. We had a pizza lunch outside the train station; hot chocolate at the hotel and breakfast at the airport ... and that was really as exciting as it got!)
.jpg)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment