Venice is little islands surrounded by small stretches of water and you get around by boats. The first thing we did was get a boat from the mainland to the main island of Venice. Then we were treated to a gondola ride first up.
Our gondola rower was not as authentic as some, as he chatted on his mobile phone, smoked constantly and looked like he belonged in the back streets of skinhead lane. He did attempt to sing to us tho, but we wished he hadn't at times lol.
It was a nice gondola ride tho, as it was quiet and serene and gave us an insight into how people live in venice and not just the touristy parts. We went under lots of little bridges but perhaps one of the more memorable ones was the bridge of sighs. This bridge was the last light of day prisoners saw when they were being escorted into the prison on the other side of the bridge and it is said that whenever a prisoner was taken there, they would have one last look out the windows to the free world and sigh as it was possibly the last they would see of it in their life time. Very sad but a beautiful bridge.
Afterwards we wee treated to a drink in St. marks square, which is the central square of Venice where all the people come and congregate. I had a peach Bellini and mum had a hot chocolate you could stand your spoon up in! If we had have paid for these ourselves, we would have been up for $25 or more, as they also charge for you to sit down on their seats! We watched the world go by for about an hour. We had a sneaky gelati in there too!
We walked to our boat which was taking us to our own island where our hotel is, called lido island. On the way to the boat however we saw the bridge of sighs again. It's a haunting place but nice to see from the outside rather than what those prisoners saw instead.
Once we got to the island of lido, we settled into our hotel which is covered on the outside with mosaic tiles and it is very artsy fartsy and pretty inside.. We were treated to dinner at the hotel, as we have an early start in the morning for a trip to murano island where they make the famous murano glass and we also go to some other smaller islands to mooch around. A good day to do not much for mum and I as it will be Anzac day here.
Thought I would tack on the next day we had in Venice onto this post. We went to murano island and watched a glass blowing demonstration. This was great as we got to see how each sculpture was made and how intricate and delicate work it is, but how proud and talented the people who do it are about their work. It brought a tear to my eye to watch a man work on his craft with such pride.
We went and had lunch on an island called burano. This lunch was huge and jam packed full of seafood. As we had such a big lunch, mum and I decided we didn't need dinner so we hit the hay early and got some rest for the next day. We are off to Vienna tomorrow!
Got your post card, thank you so much :-) it made my day. Hey can you sneak one of those hunky Italian waiters home with you? They sound like fun to have around ;-)
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