We left early in the morning on Friday the 23rd (Happy Birthday Kailey!- more on this later...)and flew to Treviso, Italy (about 45 minutes away from Venice). A man with a big van took us into Venice and dropped us off at the main bus station. We took a vaporetto (water bus) to one station where we should have been able to catch the next bus to the island our hotel was on. BUT- they were having strikes and we had to walk for a bit. Danny reassured us that it would only be a 10 minute walk. Now, keep in mind that we had all of our luggage with us (8 people, 8 suitcases plus 6 backpacks)and Madi was not to be trusted walking alone. If only we would have taken a picture of us! As it was, we walked through a crowd similar to this one:
There was some murmuring from the shorter ones, but it is a fun memory for me. And we did arrive at the next bus stop about 20 minutes later. (Danny's optimism already at work.)
After getting on the correct waterbus- we headed for the island of Lido- which is a 10- 15 minute boat ride outside of Venice. The island isn't very big- so Danny and I decided that we could walk the 10 minutes to get to our hotel. Another slight miscalculation- 25- 30 minutes later we arrived at our hotel. The kids were tired and hungry- so after we checked in at our hotel- we went to eat at a nice little restaurant.
Our first day was the only day in our entire vacation when it really rained. We were so lucky!
On day 2- we went into Venice and went on a walking tour of the city. Kailey and Danny planned our entire itinerary and did a fabulous job.
Shelby thought the carnivale masks were great.
Emery with gondolas and St. George's church in the distance.
We saw St. Marks church (where he is supposedly buried) and it has loads of amazing mosaics. It is a beautiful church. (Jake just reminded me that the tour guide said there were more than a million mosaics in the church.)
How our family entertained themselves during the tour...
A typical canal behind us. Isn't it beautiful?
Our teenager with gondolas in the canal behind her.
Claire on the Rialto Bridge- one of three bridges that cross the Grand Canal.
We decided we needed something different from Italian- so were thrilled when we found this nice little chinese restaurant. (Who else would eat chinese food in Italy?)
Here we are with the Rialto bridge behind us.
Gelato at St. Mark's Square (Piazza de San Marco)
Claire and Shelby with their Carnivale masks.
Madison and Claire on the boat tour.
After the walking tour and lunch- we went on a motorboat tour of Venice. Talia, our guide is from Connecticut and has lived in Venice for 8 years. She was excellent and gave us fun information. My favorite story was the rich family who would tell their party guests that they didn't need to wash and reuse their gold plates- they would just throw them over the balcony. Little did their guests know that they had a net to catch all of the plates and their servants would fish them out of the canal, wash and reuse them.
A view of the Rialto Bridge from the canal.
Danny, Emery, Madi and I and Jake.
All of the houses in Venice are called palaces. I thought that these were beautiful.
Jake with St. George's Basilica behind us.
Danny and the kids outside of Piazza San Marco. The Doge's Palace is in the background on the left. I love how Madi posed for this photo!
1 comment:
such beautiful places! and your family just couldn't get any cuter. that picture of Claire on the bridge is adorable.
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