Venizia, Italia

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie...that's amore! yeah we arrived in Venice today, so this Dean Martin favorite slowly took the place of the sound of music songs playing in our heads. Some may recall this as one of my favorite songs last year, for no apparent reason. But it seemed fitting for our next stop. Not just because the song is quasi-italian, but more because it's so cheesey. And as much as I love Venice, its definitly on the cheesey side.

The first day we got there kind of late in the afternoon. But as usual we try to see the whole city the first night. It's habit or something. So that first afternoon/night we walked the entire city, not an easy task. To find the major spots, like the Rialto bridge and San Marco square, is not someting you can do by looking at a map. Instead you try to point yourself in the right direction and just walk. As you wind through various ally ways and over bridges big and small you start to wonder if you'll ever make it out of the maze that is Venice. Eventually you see signs with arrows that you faithfully follow for about an hour (though you seem to walk in circles), and eventually you get there. On the way you can stop to admire the many masks in the famous Carnival shops or check out some venician glass in one of their many shops. At some point you find yourself in the middle of a million tourists, and at that point you know you've found something. I didn't mind them as much as most people do. They add another dimension to traveling. They're often a sight to see in and of themselves. I'm one of them. It's wierd. Some of them are way over excited, some frustrated, some spend some much time taking pictures you wonder if they stop to see the city without looking through the lens of thier cameras.

I really loved the archetecture here. Everything is old and delicate. The whole city seems as fragile as the galss they're famous for making. The buildings just scream history and pride, both of which the city seems to hold onto for dear life while it's slowly being adulterated by tourism (the only thing, ironcially, that still keeps it alive). The canals really are cooler then you'd think. There are no cars. The buses are boats. You have to cross more bridges, big and small, then you'd ever imagine. The gondolas are sweet, but too pricey for the likes of me. Its just crazy that they designed and built a city where you need boats to traverse it. You can see many buildings where the steps to the front entrance lead directly from the water, no sidewalk or anything. Bizarre but cool.

Dana and I happened to be staying in a suburb of Venice so we went to one of thier local pizzarias for food. The waiter was crazy. He kept telling us about all his specialties and this special cheese his dad makes in Napoli. He was italian, he was a talker...when it came time to order we actually didn't get to order anything. He picked for us. A special not on the menu, but with his dad's special cheese. So we were way confused but it was funny. He came out with flavored pizza crust and a plate of tomatoes and cheese. It was actually really good. A rare dish we probably wouldn't have tried otherwise. We had to disappoint him later when we declined to hang out with him after work. Oh well.

Well we saw al lwe wanted to of Venice in half a day, so we decided to head elsewhere the next day. We thought about Florence, but the David statue was closed and I didn't feel like doing the museam thing all day. So Dana, the genius, suggested finding a beach in Venice. Brilliant. We were joined by our new friend Katie from Washington who has been traveling Europe solo. She's super sweet and she was pumped for relaxing for a day. We spent a good afternoon there and got some sun. We got to take a dip in the Adriatic. Life is good. It got even better when we found some gelato on the way home. It's pretty much heaven in a cup.

Later that night we got all cleaned up and went back into Venice to see it at night. It was gorgious. The restaurants all had a very romantic ambiance, not to mention the gondolas drifting down the canals. The three of us wandered until we saw the best gelato and we had some more. We got ourselves to the other side of the city again, and had to maze our way back out. It's much longer when its late and you're tired. But we made it to the train and caught our ride back to the burbs. All in all Venice was about what I expected. Very touristy, but still beautiful and unique. The atmosphere hadn't been killed completely by tourism so I liked it. Now we're headed to Rome where we have 2.5 days to see it all. I have a feeling we're only going to scrape the surface. I'm super pumped. I'm sad that this is our last city till Paris. It's starting to hit me that I might actually have to leave. But for now, I'm taking it all in. Vita vella. Ciao!