MONDAY, SEP 28th, 2015
After three flights
and about 17 hours of travel time, we landed in Venice at 10:00am. I actually teared up as we landed and saw the spires of St. Mark's across the water on the island of Venice. I had only dreamed of this day and it was now
a reality. WE WERE IN VENICE!!!
After disembarking, we
headed to the main terminal area to pick up our tourist passes that we had
bought online a few days before we left home (www.veneziaunica.it/en).
The counter was not very well marked as it was just a couple of windows beside
another counter but after wandering around a bit and not finding it, I went
back and asked at the counter and they pointed me in the right direction. These passes were a life saver! We had tailored the passes to what we wanted
to do so we had selected the 3-day unlimited vaporetto pass for €40pp, airport bus
transfer to Piazzale Roma for €6pp and entry to the Doge’s Palace plus three
other St. Mark’s Square museums for €18pp (€11 for seniors). Since one trip on a vaporetto costs €7,50, we
saved more than enough to make these passes worth their while. We received a card that was to be scanned each
time we used the vaporetto and also was our access for the ACTV Aerobus trip into
Venice. The museum passes I printed out
at home before leaving for Europe.
We left the terminal
by the door with the sign for Ground Transportation. We did not have to walk very long before
looking to the left and seeing the sign for Linea 5 (Aerobus). We got in line and the bus arrived a couple
of minutes later. This bus is the local
transport bus so has hard plastic seats, an open area to store your luggage and
it makes several stops on its way to Venice.
You can buy a pass for the ATVO bus which has more cushy seats, storage
for luggage under the bus and does not make as many stops. I think the cost would have been €8 for that
bus.
I really can’t
remember how long it took us to get to Piazzale Roma as I was too interested in
seeing all of the sights but I would guess it took around 25-30 minutes. The bus let us off in Piazzale Roma,
which is the only parking lot on the island of Venice. Since there are pretty much no vehicles on
the island, all vehicle traffic ends here.
I think we only saw two other vehicles elsewhere on the island over the
next three days.
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| Our first view of the canals |
Our first challenge
was trying to figure out exactly where we were so we could then navigate to
where we were going to pick up the key for our apartment rental. After a few false starts, we eventually felt
we were headed in the right direction. NOTE: a good map is really helpful but prepare to
get lost anyway…you will! We bought an international phone package before heading to Europe and it allowed us a certain number of calls, texts and data so we were able to use Google maps when we got really stuck. Special note: we were not told that this package only worked ON LAND and not when we were at sea on the cruise ship so you will want to clarify that if you choose to purchase this type of package.
As we were
crossing a bridge, we heard a scream and saw our friend running toward us. She and her parents had flown in from the UK and had already scoped out the
pickup spot for the key so they were able to easily guide us where we needed to go.
There were some tears and lots of hugs.
It had been six years since we had seen her and it was the first time meeting
her parents.
The apartment was not
ready so we had about an hour to kill.
We wandered around taking in the whole experience: the constant hum of
boat engines, splashing water, church bells and people everywhere. I could barely carry on a conversation as I was so enraptured with all that was going on around me. It was just mind-blowing that we were finally
in Venice! We found a little café and
took a couple of outdoor tables to enjoy some sun, drinks and a wee snack. The café was called Bar Due Ruote on Fondamenta
Fabricca Tabacchi.
An hour later, we
headed back to the rental office for Above The Tide to pick up the key to our
apartment and to give our final payment and get our instructions. We navigated our way through the alleyways
pretty well since both Dad and I had ‘walked’ the path using Google’s street
level view on our computers at home.
We rented the
apartment through Veniceapartments.org.
We paid a deposit by credit card but they wanted a money transfer for
the balance however, we were not able to do that from Canada. They were very flexible and said we could
just pay the balance in cash on arrival.
There is some type of law in Italy about private individuals who are
renting out their apartments not being permitted to accept credit cards. Since the deposit was paid to a management
company, we were able to use a credit card for that portion.
We were absolutely thrilled
with the apartment! You are always a bit nervous as to whether a place is as lovely as the pictures online seem to show but it exceeded
our expectations. It had a lounge area,
dining room, bathroom, two bedrooms plus another bed in the lounge, an eat-in
kitchen and a lovely little courtyard with a chair swing and café table. Jet lag was hitting us then so we all had a
nap for a couple of hours to try and take a bit of the edge off but not enough
that we would not sleep that night. We
headed out to explore about three hours later.
Our next challenge to
conquer was the vaporetto docks at Piazzale Roma. Vaporettos are long passenger boats that travel
all around Venice. Some spots only have two docks and others have four docks and Piazzale Roma had four due to being a central hub. We knew we wanted to take the slower route (45
minutes) down the Grand Canal to San Marco and knew we wanted Line #1. We knew that one boat would go in one direction and another boat
would go in the other direction, which was not down the Grand Canal. We had a crash course in reading the
electronic boards as well as the boards that show all of the various stops and the
direction of travel arrow. We figured out that the
boats all had a route map and direction indicated on the front of the boat, however, we also
realized that they did not always turn the signs around when they changed direction so
learned to not always rely on that cue.
Eventually, we got our bearings, scanned our pass on the machine (wait
for the beep) and got in line. Always
validate your pass before getting on any transportation. Signs warn that they will fine you if they do
a check and find you have not validated.
We never saw anyone check but better safe than sorry. A tip about disembarking the vaporetto: when you know your stop is coming up, do not wait to stand up and make your way to whatever side they will be disembarking on. They quickly pull up to the dock, the passengers get off and they pull quickly away. We learned that lesson early on when we did not get near enough to the exit and the vaporetto pulled away before we could disembark. We had to go to the next stop, get off and back on a vaporetto heading back to where we wanted to go. Speed is the name of the game...even though it is a pretty laid back culture, in general.
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| Vaporetto dock |
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| A vaporetto arriving at the dock |
We wanted one of the vaporetto that have an open seating area at the front so we could have a primo view of our cruise down the canal (thanks for the tip, Rick Steves!). The trip took about 45 minutes and
we just took everything in as we motored along: the light, the boat traffic,
the gondolas and gondoliers, the palazzos, the colours. Incredible!!
I could barely contain myself! Dave
read to us from Rick Steves’ Mediterranean Cruise Ports guide as we went
along. It helped us pick out buildings
of interest and learn a bit about them.
This book was absolutely invaluable to us the entire trip. The tips that we got from it saved us money,
time and let us in on some things that we would not have easily discovered ourselves.
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| A traghetti which is a local 'ferry' to take you across a canal. If you don't want to spend 100 euro for a gondola ride, spend a couple of euro to experience a traghetti trip. |
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| Gondolas everywhere |
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| Palazzo architecture |
We disembarked at the
San Marco vaporetto stop and made our way to St. Mark’s Square.
We also realized that the next stop (San
Zaccaria) would have been closer to St. Mark’s so next time went to that stop.
We walked along the waterfront getting the
lay of the land and checking out all of the vendors stretching out along the walkway.
We saw the Bridge of
Sighs that goes between the Doge’s Palace and the prison and then we spotted a
little alley off to the left past the prison and decided to dive into the
warren of alleys that run all over Venice.
We just wandered around, taking turns where we wanted to.
When we were ready to head to St. Mark’s
Square, we just looked up on the buildings for yellow signs with an arrow pointing
the way to San Marco.
If we got lost at
any time, we just looked for a yellow sign pointing to one of the main areas
(Piazzale Rome, San Marco, Ferrovia, etc) and we could always find our way to
someplace familiar and go from there.
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| The Bridge of Sighs |
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| Pigeons take over St. Mark's Square |
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| Direction signs were so helpful |
We spent a good while
wandering around St. Mark’s Square and taking photos. It was late in the day and the crowds were thinning
out, but there was still a good crowd of people around. We met up with our friend and her parents and then
headed in the direction of the Rialto Bridge to a little restaurant that her Mom had
found.
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| Rialto Bridge was under construction |
We had two celiacs in our group and
this restaurant offered gluten-free options.
Italy has an amazing set-up for gluten-free. They actually have a certification process
for restaurants and even if a restaurant is not officially certified, there
are still many that offer gluten-free options. Here is a great post I
found on eating gluten-free in Italy. It
also explains how to find certified restaurants and how to print out a
restaurant card that tells waiters, in their language, that you are
celiac. I printed out cards for Italy
and for Spain. There was also one for Greece. http://www.primalpalate.com/paleo-blog/eating-gluten-free-in-italy/
The restaurant was called Ostaria Antico Dolo on Ruga Rialto, 778. It was a small restaurant
with gorgeous wood paneling and cozy lighting. It was everything Italian that
we wanted it to be! I had simple spaghetti with tomatoes and
basil and Dave had the gluten free version.
Others had the seared sea bass and pumpkin gnocchi and everything tasted
delicious. We were so tired that we pretty much
staggered our way to the Rialto vaporetto dock – full and jetlagged – and made
our way back to the apartment and to bed.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER
29/15
My sister and I were
both awake by 7am, when the church bells nearby started to ring. I had a great sleep and was ready for
action. We snuck quietly out of the
apartment and made our way, with our always present cameras, in the direction of
the Rialto Market. The streets were
quiet, with very few tourists and lots of locals going about their regular
business. We did not take a map and just
took lanes that looked interesting and felt like the right direction. Every now and then, we would check for the yellow
signs for “per Rialto” and adjust our course.
The sun rising over the Grand Canal was so beautiful and the canal was
already humming with boat traffic and deliveries.
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| Wandering the alleyways in the quiet of the early morning |
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| The sun rising over the Grand Canal |
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| Rialto Market |
Our plan at the market
was to get provisions for breakfast, snacks for sightseeing as well as supper that
evening. We made a tour through the
entire market and then stood back and watched where the locals seemed to be
going and got an idea of how things worked.
We made an effort to communicate in Italian as much as possible, with
the help of our little pocket “Italian for Travelers” guide. Everyone we dealt with was very patient and
gracious with our efforts and even helped out if we pronounced things
wrong. We walked back to the apartment
weighed down with fruits, vegetables and fish.
On our way, we were
keeping an eye out for a spot to pick up some eggs and milk and spotted a Coop
sign. We knew this was a grocery chain
so we went in. My sister wanted to get a
couple of oranges as well and so began a rather hilarious venture of trying to
get the cashier to ring up our purchase.
We took the eggs, milk and two oranges to the cash. The cashier shook her head “No” and said
“pésé” which we figured meant ‘weigh’ because it is a similar word in
French. We went back to the scale and
weighed the oranges but could not see where you could print out a ticket so
took a photo of the screen and took it back to her. She frowned and shook her head again and shooed us away…so back we
went. Heather finally got an employee
and brought him around to the scale and made the international sign for help
(helpless shrugging). He showed us where
the button was to print a label and the bags to put the oranges in. We got back to the cashier and she gave us a
smile and a thumbs up. We felt as though we had
met a great challenge and conquered it!
We got back to the
apartment just as everyone was waking up, made some breakfast and tried to make a
cake for our friend. Mom had brought
pretty much everything from home to make the cake but every time we turned the
oven on, the electricity went out in the apartment. We would have to go out into the hallway,
flip the switch and back in to try again.
We ended up making small cakes in the microwave but it took a good long
time to get them all done.
It was around 1pm when
we headed out to meet our friends at San Giorgio Maggiore, a small island across the canal from St. Mark's Square. We caught the #2 vaporetto this time. It takes a different route than #1 and does
not make as many stops so the ride goes quicker. We wanted to go to San Giorgio Maggiore
because I had read that the view from the campinale (tower) was even better than
that of St. Mark’s Campinale and the cost was €6 instead of €11 with way less
of a line. On the way, we spotted our cruise ship (Norwegian Spirit) making its way up the canal toward the cruise dock.
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| The Norwegian Spirit steaming up the canal |
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| The view of St. Mark's from San Giorgio Maggiore |
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| San Giorgio Maggiore at sunset |
Once on the island, we took our time wandering
through a couple of art exhibits and the church before heading to the back end of the church to buy tickets
for the tower. There were only about
five people in line and only four people at a time could fit in the elevator, but things moved very quickly. From the tower, we had a 365 degree view of
Venice and the surrounding area and since it was a beautiful, sunny day, we
could even see the Italian Alps in the distance.
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| The view from the campinale |
It was now
mid-afternoon and we were very hungry. Our
friends gave us a map with gluten-free pizza restaurants marked on it. We figured out which one was closest and
caught a vaporetto to the Zaterre stop and walked until we found the address. The restaurant was called Ae Oke and was
located on the Giudecca Canal. We were
able to eat right beside the canal in the sunshine. Dave had his first ‘real’ pizza in four years
and was a very happy man! The pizzas
were much larger than we thought they would be – probably 12 inch sized with a
thin, crispy crust and they had many options on their menu. The cost was quite reasonable for Venice. I think around €7-8 per pizza.
After getting
refueled, we headed to the Doge’s Palace.
Since it was later in the day, there was no line to get in and we only
had about an hour and a half until closing.
It was so amazing to see the architecture and the ornate décor. The frescoes on the wall and ceilings were so
rich and vibrant. We walked through the
Bridge of Sighs and into the prison as well.
We want to go back and have much more time to go through the palace next
time.
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| The Doge's Palace |
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| The interior courtyard of the Doge's Palace |
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| Incredibly ornate gilding and frescos |
We got back to the
apartment and had a very late supper. We
wanted an early night but were up until almost midnight wrestling with the
washer and trying to figure out just what we had to do to get it to release our
soaking wet clothing to us. We ended up
getting the door open and had to wring out every piece of clothing and hang
things out in the garden and on any piece of furniture we could find. The adventures of working with unfamiliar
appliances…with instructions and labels in a foreign language.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER
30/15
We got up the next
morning and packed up everything as we had to vacate the apartment by
10am. Our friends showed up just before
10am and we shut everything up and went to drop our key off at the rental
office. Our friend’s parents headed out to sightsee and we made our way to the People
Mover at Piazzale Roma. The People Mover
is a monorail-type train that transports people between the parking lot area and the
cruise terminal. It costs €1,50 per trip. It was still a bit of a
walk to our ship and we dropped
our luggage at the drop off, got checked in around 11am and were on the ship by
noon. We left our carry on bags in our
cabins and headed to Raffles buffet to grab some lunch. Mom and Dad stayed on the ship and the rest of us got back off, took the People Mover back to Piazzale Roma and caught the
#2 vaporetto to San Marco.
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| Disembarking the vaporetto |
We did a bit
of shopping along the way and left our friend to tour The Doge’s Palace with
her parents and thus began one of the most enjoyable afternoons of rambling and meandering through the
back streets and alleyways behind St. Mark’s Square. We had no plan or route, we just went where
things looked interesting or appealing.
We came across a small artisanal gelateria (La Mela Verde) where we
grabbed a treat to enjoy while we wandered.
Both the gelato and sorbet were incredible. The flavours were creative and bold. I had the pink grapefruit sorbet and the
Lemon Mint Basil sorbet. Divinely
delicious!
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| Mmmmmm! |
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| A new adventure down every alley |
As we walked, we heard some music coming
from an alley and followed the sound to a small museum courtyard. We made our way up the stairs to find that it
was free entry so we took advantage and toured the various exhibits. We literally spent close to three hours just
exploring. We found small campos
(squares), lots of bridges, beautiful architecture, incredible doors, ornate metalwork…a
feast for the eyes everywhere we looked.
Needless to say, our cameras got a workout!
We met back up with our friend back at St. Mark’s,
bid farewell to her parents and started walking toward the Accademia
vaporetto stop. We had not been to this
area of Venice so it was nice to have a chance to check it out. It was getting quite chilly as we walked so
we stopped off at a small café (fittingly called 'Le Café') so we
could get something warm to drink and some wi-fi access to bombard the outside world with a few photos. After we got warmed up, we caught the
vaporetto back to Piazzale Roma and the People Mover back to the cruise
terminal and were back on the ship by 7:30pm.
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| The view from the Accademia Bridge |
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| The sun sets on our final day in Venice |
We were famished so first order of business was a good supper in the
Garden Room. Butternut Squash Pancetta
as an appetizer, Roast Beef with potatoes, corn and broccoli for the entrée and
a Baked Apple dessert. Our comfy cabin
was a very welcome sight after a long day of sightseeing and we had an early
night.
Venice was truly a delight and turned out
to be my absolute favorite spot of our entire trip/cruise. I had looked at so many videos and photos but
being there was just so much more than I had ever expected. Photos cannot communicate the atmosphere, the
sounds and the smells all around you. They
cannot truly show the quality of the light, the footsteps echoing along the
alleyways, the musicality of hearing conversations in Italian all around
you. You never come home the same person
when you travel. Everything you see and
experience leaves its mark on you.
Venice is forever in my mind and I do hope that I have the chance to go
back and experience it once again. Arrivederci
Veneto!!
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