UK cheechako

Venice

Since there are no cars in venice you have a choice of walking, taking a water taxi, or riding the bus. We opted for the bus, since we were doing enough walking already, and the taxis were too expensive (at least for my cheap arse).
Since we have been over here, we have gotten pretty used to using public transportation, but the water buses in Venice are a different story. They are essentially floating cattle cars where they pack you in like sardines (you'll have to excuse the mixing of metaphors). If you look closely (or you could just click on it to expand it) at the picture you can see all the people crammed onto the water bus. What you see (people riding the bus) is actually the least traumatizing part. It is literally a free-for-all getting on and off these things. There is supposed to be an entrance lane for people waiting to get on and an exit lane for those wanting to get off. It seems this is merely a suggestion, because once the entrance line gets too long people just rush the exit line, thus creating the free-for-all. If going in the out door doesn't work for you, apparently you just yell 'permesso', act like you are getting on another bus which is about to leave (there are multiple bus routes), and push your way through the crowd. I thought permesso meant excuse me I need to get through, but it obviously means "I'm an old Italian woman and I can't be bothered to stand in line, so get out of my way".

But other than that, Venice is great.

Our hotel, Hotel Al Ponte Mocenigo, was fantastic, and they served the best cappuccino I have ever had. If you ever get to Venice, I highly recommend both.

To the right is a picture of Saint Mark's Square and the Cathedral. It's pretty impressive, but I don't recommend it if you have any issues with birds. You can't see it but there are pigeons everywhere you look. Apparently people don't realize that pigeons are nothing more than flying rats, because they let their kids feed them from their hands. I didn't have bird issues until I visited this place.

With your bus pass you also get access to the islands of Venice, so we toured the islands one day.

To the left is a picture of Burano (known for its colorfully painted houses and lace). They call it a miniature Venice. And no trip would be complete without a visit to Murano and it's glass factories. Below is a picture of one of the glass
making facilities. Pretty fancy chandelier for a factory huh? There is also a shot of YG on a bridge in Murano.




To the right is a shot of the Accademia Bridge. It was originally built in 1922 out of wood as a temporary bridge, but it was left becuase of it's popularity. It is the only wooden bridge still crossing the Grand Canal.






I'm tired of writing and thinking, so now you're just going to get some shots of Venice.











The Grand Canal and the Rialto Bridge, with the obligatory Gondolier.











More gondolas in the side canals around St. Marks square

posted by Yankee @ 6:51 PM