Oh Venice, You Gorgeous Thing!

After spending a night in Rome at Georgia and Fede's place, it was time to hop on a train to Venice. The 4 hour express train runs through Tuscany and then veers north-east to head over to Venice. The first thing you run in to as you exit the train station is the water-taxi drivers and the luggage trolley guys. They come at you: "You need taxi Miss?" "I take you to hotel... come..." "Put your suitcase on here. I'll be your porter." 


All the guys in the orange vests... There is a wall of them. I've had to learn to forget about being polite, just be firm and push through. "No." "No, grazie." "No." In some countries/cities it's illegal for them to solicit business, but they still do... "Taxi Miss?" "You need taxi to hotel? I'll take you". I figured that these guys in Venice must at least be legal... They were wearing hi-vis vests with their job title printed on them! 

But I didn't want a water taxi. I had instructions from my hotel that it was easy to get there on the public transport ferries that ran every few minutes. I just had to get a ticket and hop on the right one! Station A, Boat Number 2 or 2/. How hard could it be...? I bought a 3-Day City Pass which got me on all public transport (there was only boats) as well as discounted tickets into some museums, tours and exhibits. Then passed through the gates to the canal proper. There are a LOT of ferries and a LOT of different ferry routes! I think it was sheer luck, or the travel fairies sitting on my shoulder that got me on the right one, first go... And from the boat I got my first glimpse of old town Venice. Houses, businesses and shops all backed onto the canals, some with space to tie up their own boats, some with water lapping on the doorstep.




Some were just rotting away... Several stops into the trip my boat pulled up at the Rialto dock, where I had been told to disembark to most easily reach my hotel. Once you get away from the main canals, Venice is a maze of small alleyways, bridges and mini-canals. My first thought was that I would never find anything here, and if I disappeared into the maze I might never be seen again!

Thankfully, the hotel hosts had sent a video of how to get from Rialto to the hotel. I did a lot of rewinding and double-checking (also trying to manoeuvre my big suitcase and my small suitcase and my handbag over the cobblestones, and up and down the stairs onto the bridges, without dropping my phone in the canal), and I made it to the hotel. I NEVER would have found it without the video!


                                                                                                                                                                                     


When I booked the hotel I had been warned that the room was up three flights of stairs without an elevator. "No worries" I thought. "3 flights, no problem" I said. What I hadn't taken into account was three flights of super-steep stairs carrying a 15kg suitcase and a bulging carry bag. Luckily I had left my big suitcase at my sister's place in Rome, and had decanted a few days of stuff into my smaller suitcase. But packing light has never been my strength...

The room was opulent to the point of visual overload. 😲

But the bed was the most comfortable bed I have EVER slept in!

After spending an hour or so settling in and having a rest, I went exploring to find some dinner. I navigated the alleyways and lanes back towards Rialto, so I would know my way back in the dark. I browsed some of the restaurant menus on the way, but in the end I got a slice of pizza so huge that I couldn't finish it...


Followed by an absolutely decadent gelato... Cheesecake flavour! My two favourite desserts combined. 🙌😋

If I keep eating like this, they will have to roll me onto the plane home.


Next up: Venice, Part 2





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Rest of Venice

Image
The next morning I just started wandering with no particular destination in mind. A couple of times I found myself in areas with less people around. They didn't have a good feeling so I changed direction to go where there were more people (counterintuitive for me to want to be around people, but the best way to stay safe when travelling alone). I found myself in Piazza San Marco... with Basilica San Marco at the other end: I would have liked to go inside here and had a look, but the queue was an hour and a half long, and was fully exposed to the sun most of the way. I only had one day to explore... I wasn't going to spend it in a queue. Instead, I got coffee... The cafes have to protect the pastries because the local birds are brazen enough to come onto your table and take them. The quality of the coffee is very hit and miss. Most places don't know what a flat white is, so I just default to asking for a cappuccino.  But the pastries are amazing! After a very average coffee ...
Read more

Onward to Riga

Image
 The 4 hour bus trip from Tallinn to Riga, capital of Latvia, was punctuated by rain, rain, rain, and a touch of hail! And the wind hadn't abated. Riga Bus Terminal is currently surrounded on almost all sides by major works that they are doing to the railway, roads and tram tracks.  When we arrived rain was persisting down. We all disembarked from the bus and then stood around in the rain while we waited for the luggage compartments to be opened. The driver (still sitting in the nice warm bus) seemed completely oblivious to our misery and took his sweet time. We were finally able to grab our suitcases and bags and run (as much as we were able with aforementioned luggage) to the terminal. Minimalist is probably the nicest way to describe it. Hopefully this terminal is getting an upgrade as part of the works that surround it... A side-effect of the heavy works is that the cars of the Baltic version of Uber (called Bolt) can't get near the terminal. We had to head out in the rain...
Read more

Vilnius, Riga (again), back to Vilnius

Image
Well, all I can say is "I'm an idiot!". And don't talk to me about improving my negative self-talk. I truly am an idiot. We'll get to that... We left Riga in the rain, getting a Bolt (like Uber) to as close to the bus stop as we could, then making a mad dash in the mud to the terminal. We finally got aboard the bus and felt warm and dry for the first time since leaving the weird apartment. The bus ride from Riga to Vilnius is just over 4 hours and is pleasant enough, passing through rural areas and small towns. There is a detour in place for road works at the moment and we had to cross the border at a place different to the main border crossing, on a tiny road near a tiny village with tiny roads that obviously weren't made to have buses navigating between the centuries-old clay and mud-brick buildings.  But the only thing that actually denoted the border between Latvia and Lithuania was the police car sitting off to the side. They did nothing and we continued ...
Read more