Upon porting to WordPress this little ditty was staring at me under ‘Drafts’. I’m glad to dust it off and put it in its rightful place.
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Prior Pages:
- Starting in Milan
- Florence Italy Part 1 of 2
- Florence Italy Part 2 of 2
Heading from Florence to Venice was our best train ride yet. We rode on the Eurostar in second class. Lots of foot room, computer power, tables, smooth fast ride. For all the travel we did we never missed a car. Why hassle?
Once in Venice we had to aquaint ourselves with the water bus system. I was a little shocked at their pricing. For a public bus service it cost us 12EU to get a one way ticket for passengers and luggage to our stop at Zattere. Immediatly upon being in Venice you notice the lack of car sounds. You get kind of used to this low level moto-buzz that was pretty consistant from city to city. However here, there is no city traffic. You see a lot of strong men carrying/carting goods all over the place. This labor is translated into the price of everything, but I am getting ahead of myself.
Once at Zattere we walked about 4 blocks along one of the outer canals to reach our hotel, Pensione Calcina. Our check in was met with a friendlyness and hospitality. Once in our room we were excited to find that we had a lovely terrace overlooking the canal and hotel restaurant. Deciding that we did not want to journey far for lunch we ate at the hotel. We ended up eating a toasted prosciutto e formaggio panini & salad. Robin and I ate light because the meal was so expensive. It seems the more on the water you are whether east or west coast and you’re going to pay a higher rate than when you are in the interior. Back to the earlier statment of seeing all the labor to bring goods to these places, at least here it is probably justified. At any rate we had a delightful sandwhich and a very expensive salad with our 3EU water.
With our tank refueled we decided that it was late enough in the day that we didn’t want to really see any one specific thing. We meandered along the canals west of the Rialto. Passing many little piazzas, tons of artisanal shops ranging from hand gilded masks, glass works, jewlery, pastry, pasta. Again we found a city chock full of antiquity. Enjoying ourselves we passed the old Venice market place and paused over the Rialto.
Much time has passed and this is where I had laid my pen.. on fond reflection we did more, we had a few good seafood based dinners, drank much more coffee, ate confections, and wandered around the squares and museums. We then packed up or gear and headed back to Milan, where to our dismay our hotel was under repair. They were so very kind though and whisked us to another sister hotel where we were given a nice room and a ride to the airport far far too early the next morning.
We miss Italy, and will have to return to continue our journey, re-reading our chronicals has brought back many a fascinating memory.
-a