2 On the Road: Italy

My sister and I left our husbands at home and took a trip to Italy. After 19 hours of planes and airports we arrive in Venice, Italy. We walked the mile from the Marco Polo Airport to the Alilaguna boat dock and waited for our boat to come.

Finally we left the dock behind and started our boat trip to Venice.

Venice is surrounded by other islands and the lanes for the boats are lined with log tripods.

The police were out patrolling the lanes. I really wondered who had the right-of-way at the intersections. Boats don't stop like cars.

By the time we got to shore, I had already lost our printed itinerary for Venice! Gees, this is starting off great. But we each had the file on our electronic devices. I was powering mine up when sis took this photograph.

From where I was standing in the previous photo, we walked straight ahead into this small alley. The yellow sign was the sign for our B&B, Alloggi Barbaria .

We were in room #4 which had a small refrigerator (where I ended up leaving one of my collapsible water bottles).

Typical of the bathrooms in all our lodging. Hot water heat, toilet flushes by using the buttons on the wall above it, hair dryer is the thing with the hose to the right of the mirror.

Also typical was the very small showers. I live in a camper trailer full-time so I have a small shower. Of our whole trip, maybe one shower was as large as it. Most of them had openings so small that I could hardly get in the shower.

By the way, Bigfoot has been to Italy. He left his footprints in the yard behind the B&B.

Finally we got our stuff stowed and went out exploring. We took lots of photos of the canals as we crossed the bridges over them.

Looks like a gondola traffic jam.

Our first Italian meal was ham and mushroom pizza. We asked if the pizza served one or two people and was told we each needed to order one, so we did. When they came, we figured there was no way we could each all that pizza. I guess we didn't, sis took a piece back to the B&B. Ended up leaving it in the refrigerator along with my water bottle. It had a thin crust so it isn't really as much pizza as you might think.

We finally made it down to St. Mark's Square. Some of St. Mark's Basilica was covered in scaffolding for renovations.

We were there during the Italian Liberation Day and St. Mark's Day in Venice, a double holiday so lots of people were in town. The lines to get into the Basilica were so long that we never did tour the inside.

The square was full of people and pigeons.

The buildings were very ornate with lots of little details.

The Campanile de San Marco is the Basilica's bell tower. We rode the elevator up the 325 feet to the top. I forgot my ear plugs so I was really happy that the bells didn't ring while we were there.

The building to the left of the campanile has statues along the top.

Here's a closer view.

More details of the Basilica

Side of the Palazzo Ducale, the Doge's Palace, home of the Venetian government and of its ruler.

This is the Bridge of Sighs, the connection between the palace and the prisons. We traversed it the next day when we went on a tour of the palace and prisons.

This is the base of the campanile where we entered to ride the elevator to the top.

The following are views from the top of the tower.

Click to see all of photo.

In this zoomed in view, you can see the airport in the background and the tripods that mark the boat lanes in the lagoon.

Same view not zoomed in.

Telephoto of part of the square and the end of the Grand Canal.
Click to see all of photo

One of the bells in the tower.

The Torre dell' Orologio, The Clock Tower, was built in 1496 and is the exit from the square that leads to the Rialto Bridge.

The clock tower is topped by these huge bronze men that strike the bell with their mallets at the top of each hour.

Murano is an island in the lagoon that is famous for its glass wear. We saw these in a shop window.

Day two in Venice we went to the Doge's Palace for the Secret Itineraries Tour.

We weren't allowed to take photos on the tour so I don't have any more of the Doge's Palace.

Next we wandered towards the Rialto Bridge. There's still a few public phones out there.

The large white thing is the top of a well. The black post is a water fountain.

Since it was St. Mark's Day in Venice, there was a parade and we saw lots of people walking around with Venetian flags.

The newest bridge over the Grand Canal is the Calatrava Bridge (the higher of the two in the photo). It was built in 2008.

We rode a vaporetto (public boat transportation) down the Grand Canal. and under the Scalzi bridge that leads to the Santa Lucia train station

We didn't get a good photo of the Rialto Bridge on the way down the canal but we got one as we rode the vaporetto to the train station the next morning. Anyway the building to the left is covered in a fake façade while it is under renovation.