Venice

We woke up at the crack of dawn again and headed to the train station to catch our 8 o'clock train. It was a lot easier this time than the trip to Florence, we got the right train and we each had a seat. I sat next to Jo-Elle and we literally had the worst seat on the train. Right in front of us was a group of two women and a man and 3 children. The oldest were two girls who looked about 5 and a 1 year old. The girls were wandering around the aisle the entire time and the baby wasn't necessarily crying but making noises the whole 3 and a half hours we were on the train. I kept giving the dad dirty looks like, "Control your children sir!". Then I finally gave in and realized they were actually really cute kids even though I couldn't tell what they were saying at all (spoke very fast Italian).

We arrived in Venice and had a 20 minute walk to the hotel through the tiniest streets I've ever seen. I didn't have much time to look around as we were walking in our Madeline lines again. All I know is 20 girls with suitcases does not easily maneuver through the streets of Venice. Our hotel was incredible! Venice is famous for glass and we had two chandeliers in our room which fit 4 people. We then went on a hunt trying to find a bakery we passed on our way to our hotel. You should have heard the ooh's and ahh's coming from the 20 girls walking by all these goodies. We walked out onto a dock to take in the view of the canal just laying before us. We sat there for a while then decided to take a gondola across the river for 50 cents.

We shopped around on the other side of the main canal and went into really cool stores which sold tons of masks, jewelry, basically the same things in every shop though. We found this street painter who had amazing artwork. Then we hopped onto a gondola for a 20-30 minute ride/tour of Venice. It was only 15 euro per person which is pretty good for what i've heard they usually cost. We saw Casanova's old home, Marco Polo's old home, the Rialto Bridge, and tons of old buildings and canals through Venice. It is literally the most interesting city I've ever seen. After the ride we started heading back to the hotel. We kept walking and when we got back we changed for dinner. We ended up just stopping at this little cafe we had passed earlier in a pretty secluded piazza.

The next day I woke up around 7:15 to shower and head out for the day. Kelly MK Kyle and I decided to head to the Doge's Palace. It was only about a 15 minute walk to San Marco's square where the palace was located. It was like stepping into a time machine heading over to this square, after walking through all the tiny streets the whole square opened up to these beautiful marble and stone buildings from century's ago. There was the cathedral, the bell tower, and the palace. It was completely empty at 8 in the morning and we had no line heading into the palace. We walked around without a guide this time just reading the info ourselves. They had a fire in the 1500's which ruined a bunch of paintings in the palace and there were competitions to see who would get to repaint them. It was shocking to find out these were replica's because all the paintings were absolutely gorgeous. It also contains the largest oil painting in the world. It was hugeeee. Every room was covered in gold and very gaudy. Kelly and I tried laying down on the floor in one huge ballroom to look at the ceiling...we were yelled at within 5 seconds. The palace also had a jail attached which we got to walk through, leading to it there is the "bridge of sighs" which got its name from prisoners taking their last look out the window at freedom before entering the prison. There was a room filled with weapons, and rooms filled with absolutely nothing at all with no purpose...wish I had the luxury to have a room dedicated to standing around and twiddling my thumbs.  

We then walked back to the hotel and got there around 11 or so. Everyone was up and a bunch of girls had already to Murano to check out the Venetian glass. We stopped at one of the markets, which are all over, and grabbed some fresh fruit for lunch. Never realized how much I missed fruit, we rarely have it with any of our meals. We took a water taxi to the island which is famous for glass, there's another island, Burano which is famous for lace. Right when we got off we were pointed in the direction of a glass factory which was showing glass blowing. It was so cool. I never actually understood the concept of blowing glass. This older man started rolling it around then blew on the tube leading to it and within two minutes had a glass vase with intricate detail. Then another guy made a glass horse. As their final act they blew a glass bubble and kept blowing it till it shattered with a loud boom.

We walked around from shop to shop and I bought a ton of gifts. Everything was so beautiful but every store had the same things. I was starting to get a little warn out with all this shopping and we eventually sat down and grabbed a late lunch. We took a water taxi back to the mainland and stopped at the hotel before dinner. We had spotted this little seafood place the day before and decided to go back. About 12 of us went and it was very fancy. We had no idea but we walked in and all the waiters were in tuxedo's. I could taste the service charge already. I ordered the gnocchi with lobster and it was magnificent. A few of the other girls ordered fish that was, well...disappointing. MK had a mouthful of bones as her first bite. She tried complaining to the waiter when we were done (they barely spoke english by the way). He asked her how it was and she said, "Well, a little boney" and he responded, "Thank you" then walked away. We could only hold our laughter for so long.

The next morning we got to sleep in a little, check out wasn't until 11. We had heard the day before about this huge kayak event taking place that Sunday down the entire canal. No motor boats were allowed in the morning for all the kayakers. They came from all over the world! There were some themed boats, I saw one where everyone was dressed up as monks, there was some relaxed kayakers, and then there were some with gongs and whistles moving fast. We thought about signing up but it was 100 to rent a kayak and 20 to register. We walked around a little more and headed back to San Marco's where we grabbed a panino and people watched. There were the strangest characters I've ever seen in Venice. I guess because it's such a touristy place you really get a motley crew of people. We saw this one woman covered in pigeons...and liking it. We found a garden just along the water and sat there for a bit eating gelato, I felt so Italian! We had just enough time to take our time walking back to the hotel. We left for the train station around 4:20 and trekked back through the eeny weeny streets. It was a lot more depressing heading this direction but it went by a lot quicker. We got onto the train, this time  in the veryyy back of the train away from crying babies. We started out going backwards though and I felt a little queazy but halfway through the ride we switched directions.

Overall, it was such a beautiful weekend and much more relaxed then any other trips we've had. I absolutely fell in love with the city and the city was filled with love!