Venice, Italy

Last stop in Italy, and it has been one for the record books.  Although I have been to Venice before, I was excited to go back. It is a tourist town through and through, but this time I was meeting my sister (who I was with there before) and Alicia, Todd’s sister, who had never been. After weeks of anticipation, we all made it there around 2pm on Saturday. Nicole and Alicia from the US, me from Cortona.

Actually, Nicole didn’t quite make it because she took some sort of water taxi and then got on it the wrong way? Who knows. Our original plan for Saturday was to meet at our AirBnB (which was more like a BnB/Hostel sort of thing) just outside the city, right next to the Mestre train station. Although I don’t recommend staying outside of the city often, Venice is so compact. And in the summer it is almost impossible to find affordable, non-hostel options. So even though this was outside the city center, it was worth it. But Nicole couldn’t quite figure out leaving the city center, so we came to her.

That afternoon, by the time we were FINALLY all together, was hot. So that meant lunch and a bottle of prosecco to stat the vacation vibes. This is basically what we did for the next 48 hours. We ate and drank our way around Venice, one bottle of wine and pizza at a time.

Prosecco in Piazza San Marco. Yes, you can drink wine and beer openly. As the vendor told us, “It’s a free country right?!” Yes, yes sir it is. 

Then, the best part of the trip happened. As we were scouring around St. Marcos Square, deciding if it was worth it to take a boat around the outside, Alicia started talking to locals and then the workers on a particular boat. For 9 Euro, they offered to let us come on a tour boat and take us around a bit. I can’t explain to you how cool this was, after they dropped off the tourist to local stops, they let us stay on for a few hours and drove us all around the grand canal of Venice. We bought them a beer, and brought on our own champagne. It was so so much fun, and we took about a million pictures at sunset to remember it. We knew how lucky we were to get this exclusive tour, and after a super later dinner and running to make it on the last train around 1am, our first day In Venice was truly a one of a kind day!

After a day like that, Day Two was hard to compare to. We were all a little tired from the day before, and basically spent the rest of Sunday walking around and drinking. Not much different than  Day One. I can say Venice is the tourist trap of all tourist traps, with similar restaurants and bars and bottles of wine around every corner. But it something to be seen, and we kept commenting about how much it felt like Disneyland. We learned quickly no true locals live within the city, and most people commute in for the tourist jobs. But worth a visit and a great last stop in Italy for me. Sister time is the best time!