Activity Level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️
Modes of transportation: 👟🛶 ⛴️ 🚌 🛫
We got an early start so we could enjoy as much Venice as we could, and we walked over to a “bar” (more like a cafe). We got some cappuccinos and various little pastries, including an amazing “fritelli,” which they only make for festivals apparently.
We had booked a gondola ride through our hotel, so we made our way over to the “dock” (more like a door out of the hotel) and boarded our boat.
We found ourselves in another hotel entrance, disguised as an alleyway. After checking us in for our ride, they led us to another alleyway inside the hotel, to a canal.
POV: You’re on a Gondola Ride in Venice:
We thoroughly enjoyed our ride.
Our gondola man gave us some great recs for food, so we went over to try some cicchetti, small plates that are a staple of Venetian cuisine. So we went off to explore the more residential parts of Venice.
The place he recommended was closed, but Eric stumbled upon a grocery store and was able to checkout the local produce.
Even though the recommended restaurant was closed, we found a really good place right next to it and ordered it all.
We also had to do it the legit way, and get some champagne and spritzes. It was just what we needed, and we wanted a light lunch to leave room for one last dinner in Italy.
Sarah still wanted shoes, so we spent much of the afternoon wandering around, in and out of shops. Nothing really caught her eye, so we just enjoyed the beautiful glass and masks in the shop windows (Venice is known for its glass, and apparently also some carnival-style masks. It reminded us of New Orleans).
At this point, we needed to find a bathroom, and came across a free architecture museum. So we took a quick pitstop.
We then decided to explore the other side of the main canal in the daylight.
While we were wandering around, we found the festival the bakery woman had mentioned earlier and Sarah got to try one of her favorites: deep fried dough covered in cinnamon sugar. Except this had a hint of orange (as part of the special festival food?).
We continued on our journey and Sarah heard some beautiful classical Vivaldi coming from a building. We had stumbled across the Vivaldi museum, and for 2 euros we were able to see some of the earliest prototypes of string instruments like violins and cellos!
Apparently, Venice used to be a central hub for stringed instrument craftsmanship in Europe, and the city had a huge music culture. Who knew!
We continued on our way and came across this statue of Saint Mark the evangelist, the patron Saint of Venice. We learned that the winged lion is a symbol of both St. Mark and the Venetian Republic’s power. Saint Mark also happened to pass away in Alexandria, Egypt. (We didn’t realize how much ancient trade happened between Italy and Egypt before this trip.)
It was late in the afternoon at this point, so we decided to enjoy the sunset from Ponte di Rialto (again) and grab an ice cream while the sky turned from blood orange to cotton candy pink and purple.
We went back to work on post cards for a few minutes, trying to leave ourselves time to mail them and have a nice dinner.
We split up to actually mail them since we were running low on time. Sarah went to buy some shoes for the third or fourth attempt (and just pull the trigger since her tennis shoes were falling apart) and Eric went to the post office.
The post office ended up taking waaaay too long because it had a huge line (and the stamps were huge—and we needed two of them. They covered up some of our writing 🤦♂️). We barely had time to get dinner, so we just had to pick a place near our hotel so we could pick up our bags.
It turned out to be sort of a disappointing last meal. We got prosciutto and mozzarella that was pretty good, but Sarah’s pasta dish was pretty bad (Eric got carbonara, and it was decent). By that time, we were running so late that we just had to eat, pay, and get out of there to board the boat to the train station (to the bus to the airport).
We had already bought the ticket for the ferry and the swipe wasn’t working, so Eric just had to jump the turnstile to catch the boat (no police saw). Turns out, it was the wrong boat anyway. Luckily, we didn’t actually get on.
Then, another scheduled boat didn’t come, so we lost another 15 minutes.
Then, the right boat came, but some people told us that we wanted to wait for the airport boat (we didn’t) so we didn’t get on the next boat. After it left, we learned that the airport boat would arrive at the airport 30 minutes before our flight. So that wasn’t going to work.
By now, we were really starting to push the time, so we ran over to another dock to catch a water taxi. He wanted to charge us 60€, but we found a ferry right nearby that seemed right. We both hopped the gate this time (we paid we swear!) and made it on that boat.
From there, we barely made the bus.
When we got to the airport, it took forever to go through security and we were starting to get nervous. By the time we got to the gate, they had luckily just started boarding, so we made it.
Funny note: our flight ended up getting delayed anyway because the air traffic controllers at ORY went on strike for we guess like 20 minutes? Not sure how that worked.
We worked on the blog on the plane, but it was otherwise uneventful. We were feeling very dehydrated by this point, so Eric paid a truly unknown amount for some water.
We got in, took the shuttle bus to the arrivals, and headed out of the airport. About 8 “bolt” taxis cancelled on us before we realized we were in the wrong part of the airport to be picked up (they must not be allowed there). Oh well.
We eventually figured it out and took a cab to our hotel. As soon as we got into our room, we immediately crashed. The bed and sheets were A+.
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