Venice...Gondola Cruising

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January 7th-10th: Venice

We slept in until 9:30 which was glorious…when we opened the curtain, we really couldn’t believe what our eyes saw: it was snowing. Big fat flakes of snow were flying down from the heavens onto the little city of Venice. How would of thought that we would experience our first European snow shower in Venice? Mitch and I were thrilled but we could tell it was just absolutely freezing outside as the wind whipped the little snow flurries into little tornados. It was an exciting moment thought and we rushed down to eat our breakfast and then get outside. One of the cool things about Venice for us was that we no longer had to really play the tourist role anymore. There were no museums or long lines to stand in, our only obligation was to wander the maze streets of Venice and eat as much pizza and gelato our wallets could handle. It was a great feeling. It’s almost impossible to navigate your way around in Venice because there are so many alleys, dead ends, and bridges that you just may as well give up. Mitch did an incredible job at navigating us, I just go wherever my feet take me which is 99% of the time the wrong way. I like to follow the lights and the shops which usually means I am not going the right way but I don’t notice because I can’t stop staring at the beautiful Murano glass in the store windows. The gelato stands always get me, there is no way I can turn around when I see that beautifulness just waiting to be eaten. Mitch has learned how to make pit stops for my weaknesses and also to come to the realization that this is how it is when you have a fat kid for a girlfriend. The city is really strange but absolutely gorgeous, one of my favorite yet. There are canals everywhere you turn and all the houses or I guess you would say apartments go really high in the air. There really is no such thing as a house here or even a lawn…The paint on the buildings is all flecking off and there are churches everywhere. The water is a beautiful green and there is a boat moored to these big sticks about every 10 feet. That’s the way these people get around, or they take the water taxis which are quite expensive. The daily life around here is just so much slower than in America, nobody is ever really in a rush and they always have time to stop and say hi to friends. Mitch and I can’t get over the lack of gym facilities, I bet 90% of these people have never even step foot into a work out room, such a different culture. Another thing we can’t get over is the abundance of heavy smokers…there are kids with braces smoking, old men with canes smoking, mothers with babies smoking…I could go on and on, its ridiculous. I just don’t understand how you can do something that you no causes a slow, painful death. Not only are you selfishly taking your own life away but you are depriving your future children, grandchildren, and family precious moments with you...all to fill your lungs with thick smoke. I just don’t get it Anyway, Mitch and I have gotten used to walking literally everywhere so we thought why not just walk all around Venice and get lost because these streets are impossible. Somehow, we didn’t get lost but we went the main bridge in Venice that is hundreds of years old. Venice is famous for two main things: Murano glass and masks like the ones in Phantom of the Opera. The masks are beautiful and really detailed and can run you up to 500 euros. We decided we would take the water taxi over to the Murano island about 40 minutes off the main area of Venice to see the glass factories. The island was absolutely deserted except for a few other tourists who were going to see the same thing we were: glass blowing. You wouldn’t believe how cold it was in Venice, so it was really nice to be able to go into the hot glass blowing room. There was this tiny man smoking a cigarette and holding a rod with a red hot ball of glass on the end of it. He would occasionally switch the cigarette and the pole and inflate the glass ball, it was a pretty cool process. He swung it around like a ninja and it made the glass form really cool patterns for a lamp shade. The glass on the island was really expensive and Mitch and I decided to just head back to Venice for some lunch as we were both starving. Lunch was definitely going to be eaten at our pizza joint where a slice was only 1.60…fit just right into our budgets. We stuffed ourselves with 3 massive slices and rolled out of the restaurant to go to the next piazza to play with pigeons. It was Mitch’s idea, he really wanted to have them sit on his shoulders and stuff. Anyone who knows me well enough knows that I absolutely hate birds, I have a bad history with them. When I was little my mom would let the huge geese chase me at the park and they were bigger than I was…pecking my head and stuff, just not a fun experience. Needless to say, I did not want to play with pigeons but Mitch started calling me a whimp and a baby so I had to rise to the occasion. I let one bird land on me and then threw it off and ran away. I had done it, right? Not good enough for Mitch and he said we were coming back the next day with bread so I could “conquer my fear”. I think he really just enjoys me freaking out. After this tramatic experience, a nap time was essential so we went back to our awesome hotel to just take a break…I mean we are on vacation, right? (my parents aren’t going to enjoy that comment). By the time we started moving around again, it was night time and neither of us was hungry because we had eaten so much pizza. However, there was a gelato stand down the street so we decided we had to take advantage of that. Yummy. After that we went home and decided to stay in and watch a movie. Yeah, I guess we really are old geezers.

It’s absolutely glorious to be able to wake up late in a beautiful city such as Venice. Some may say, you need to wake up early and tackle the city, but not Mitch and I, not in Venice. Venice is slow. It wanted you to wake up late, have some breakfast, and then walk out into its streets and ooh and ahhh over its canals with the little gondola men. So, we just do what the city wants, and didn’t get out of bed until 9:30. It was a gorgeous day, a gift from the heavens, bright blue sky with the sun just blazing into the freezing air. The first thing we did today was find those cute little Gondola men and barter our way to a cheap gondola ride. As usual, I leave the bartering to Mitch although he converses with me like a business partner…it’s all a front but somehow we always get a lower price or atleast we think. Or ride was about 2 kilometers and last about 25 minutes which was perfect for us. We got to travel in all the little canals and tiny water ways between the different buildings. Every Venetian house has 2 doors: one in the front and one in the back. I didn’t realize how old Venice was and some of the buildings have been there since the 14th century. Ridiculous. The water level rises and falls with the tides so there was an eerie green and black line on all the buildings. All the canals are pretty shallow which is why the gondola works so well being a flat and shallow boat. It was a great 25 minutes and we are really glad that we went ahead and did it because it would have been pretty lame to go to Venice and not even go on a gondola…we just decided we would eat 1.60 pizza again for dinner to make up for it. Do what you can to get by. Well after the gondola ride, we looked through a few more glass stores and that’s when it happened. When I was a kid my mom always told me “Teeter, hands in your pockets” whenever we went into an expensive store. I should have remembered that and when we went into this one store, I went to look at a necklace and apparently I knocked another necklace off that went crashing down on the floor and shattered into a billion pieces. It was no good. I am still convinced that it was a booby trap, a conspiracy, they have tourist traps like that in every glass store. They hope you break it because then you have to buy it. I was beyond angry. SO after that catastrophe, (luckily it was only 12 euro by the way but still) Mitch decided it was time to go play with the pigeons in the square AND we had bread this time. I was not in a good mood and this plan did not thrill me in the least bit. I don’t know if you have ever seen birds with bread in a plaza but they will dive bomb you, pick your eyes out, pull your hair, and poop all over you to get that bread. I wasn’t about to become one of their victims. However, Mitch knows how to tantalize me to the point where my competitive nature just can’t give in…and I ended up with breadcrumbs all over my arms and becoming a giant bird perch. At one point, a woman asked if we wanted d picture together so somehow I managed to look happy the picture of us together. Must have been a miracle of some sort. Anyway, I was beyond happy when the bird business was over and Mitch didn’t think I was a wimp anymore so we celebrated with some cheap pizza and a Guinness. It was high time to relax after all this chaos so nap time in Venice became a routine. We had to get ready to leave for Barcelona in the afternoon tomorrow as well. Mitch had a cheap dinner at restaurant but I was still full from the pizza…but not too full for gelato, and Mitch and I had our last gelato in Italy together under the star filled Venetian sky. We ended the night with some wine and another movie from the comforts of our 20 euro hotel. Oh man, What a great 3 days it’s been!!! Barcelona in the morning…our time in Europe is just dwindling away.

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Comments

[liliram]

hi there!
am glad jonathan recommended your blog. just read your take on venice and enjoyed it. you lucky soul.........been to venice a number of times, no luck with snowflakes. keep writing!

[Erin]

Great pics!
Hello there, I was just browsing your site. Great pics! You seem like such a cute couple. My dream has always been to backpack Europe! I am jealous! Enjoy the rest of your trip!