The real Venice

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We slept so well last night. We had forgotten what a difference AC makes and also what a difference a good nights sleep makes. Although we love the place we are staying in Montone, we are kept awake most nights by dogs howling and barking and there is no AC.

We ate breakfast in the hotel and were shocked how bad it was. The cereals and pastries were fine but no one in the whole room was touching the cooked food. Then we piled back into the car for a drive to Venice. We were all happy and there were no more grumps.

As there are no cars in Venice we had chosen Mestre as a place to park the car and take a train to Venice. Mestre is the last place on the mainland before Venice and we parked directly opposite the station. We obviously weren't the only ones with this plan as the station was packed and the queue for tickets huge. Somehow we were in exactly the right place when a couple of staff started to sell tickets just to and from Venice and we got our tickets for both ways, then using our excellent Italian skills we worked out the first train and got on it. 10 minutes later we were in Venice.

It was pretty busy but we quickly got off the main route to St Marks piazza and wandered around the Jewish quarter with hardly any other tourists in sight. We just enjoyed the feel of the place without going in museums or churches or even synagogues. We grabbed a coffee at a little bar and got sandwiches to eat on the lagoon front over looking Murano. At Rialto, we hired a gondola and cruised for a while around the canals. It was very relaxing and peaceful.

Then we hit the crowds. We knew we would eventually. But gelato was on hand to make us feel better. The queues were huge at St Marks and we are just about over church interiors and renaissance art. We sat in the piazza and watched the world go by and then jumped on a boat up the grand canal. The boats are the buses of Venice and zig zag up the canal, between islands and around the whole city.

It was interetsing to compare the way that the Venetians use their canals with the way those in Banjarmasin live. Both cities use the water as a means of transport, but in Banjarmasin the canals were used for so much more. The people lived their lives in and on the water. As we had cruised their we had seen so much life, people bathing, washing dishes, fishing and even playing. But here the water is solely for transport. it would be hard to imagine anyone in Venice wanting to go in the water, let alone use it for washing. They are lucky they have the choice- we take clean running water for granted.

We bought more gelato, headed back towards the station for cakes to take on the train and our day in Venice was done. Figuring out which train to get took a couple of minutes but we got there. Only trouble was there was no AC and the windows didn't open. For 12 minutes we literally baked and sweat outed out of every possible pore. We were so glad we only had to go one stop. We ate the cakes in the car and suitably satiated we set off for what we have come to consider home for now.

We stopped one time on the way for dinner and cash at a small village between Arezzo and Citta Di Castello. We were the only customers and it was a little strange but we ate anyway. Harriet and Toby were surprisingly not freaked out when they went to get cash because there was a scorpion on the wall of the bank. It was the first we had seen and we hope it stays that way.

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Photos

Wonky
Sure sign that the building is sinking