Off to Venice!

Today has been another excitement filled day. We left Rome at 8:45 am on the fast Eurostar train. It took 3 1/2 hours to go what would have taken 6 hours by car. This train was awesome! I read that you should reserve seats even if you have a pass during the busy season. That was great info. We have first class train tickets (not much more than second class but a huge difference in comfort) and it was a really enjoyable ride. Right out of the termini you begin to see fields of sunflowers. They were beautiful! Unfortunately, Italy has the same set up as New York: most of the train stations are near low income areas so their is a lot of graffiti on the buildings.

Water bus

We arrived in Venice right on time. It was fairly easy to navigate to the water buses. The only blip in the whole thing was that we needed to take boat number 1 but didn't realize that they were two #1 areas. The only way we knew was that we were waiting on our dock with a few other people and we just waved as our ride went right past us! Oh well, what would a trip with me be if we didn't get the wrong boat or something!! I might start to think that I am really good at navigating around places! :-)

Rialto Bridge in the distance

I will have to say that Venice isn't really exactly like I pictured it...say, like what you see when watching The Tourist or any of the many other movies filmed in Venice. The Grand Canal is actually really large. The small canals(like where you saw Angelina Jolie doing that amazing driving down those narrow canals) actually run inticately in and around the town. The other thing that was different is that it wasn't quite as dirty as I thought it would be. Don't get me wrong...it is far from what we consider clean, I just expected much worse.

My best piece of advice to those of you that plan to visit Venice....start saving!! There is so much for us shoppers to buy!! My favorites so far are the nice leather handbags (even the ones that aren't top designers are nice), the murano glass items (there is everything from the simplest rings and earrings to the elaborate chandeliers...some are breathtaking), and the gorgeous hand made lace tablecloths. I really want to go home with a tablecloth, but they are pricey! The price is fair though...just have to pay a lot for all that handwork.

Rialto Bridge

We took a motor boat tour around the Grand Canal and that was really fun. Since we are only hear for about 28 hours, it was a relaxing way to see a lot. Believe it or not, we may skip the gondola ride. I know that that is a must here, but we liked the boat ride quite a bit. I hate to say it, but that was a mistake too! It was one of the two things that I didn't book myself, and I must not have made it clear that we wanted to do the gondola, not the power boat. Well, Ted said that was a good mistake, so I'm off the hook for that one.

Thin House

Oh..on part of the boat tour, we passed the 'Thin House'. It is supposed to be a work of art.  What do you think?  I think that it would be hard for some of us to fit down that hallway!!  :-)

Church of the Redeemer

Another piece of info for you guys that are planning to come. yesterday and today (Sat & Sun) was the biggest celebration of Venice....or so said our tour guide. It is called the Celebration of the Redeemer. Evidently Saturday night, they had a big party with fireworks and everything. One of the neatest things they do is build a temporary bridge from Venice to the island just across where the church is. It is amazing! They only put this bridge up for two days for the whole year and they do it every year on the 3rd weekend of July. Then they take the whole thing down.

One thing that I have forgotten to mention is...now pay attention all you sweet tea drinkers out there...you can get tea everywhere!! It's in a bottle but it is pretty good. You can get it with lemon or peach flavor. This has been a life saver. When we went to Spain, there was no sweet tea of any kind to be had anywhere.

Venice

Well, I know I got a little long winded on this one but hope you enjoyed it anyway.