Venice

Smooth, but crowded and cramped flights. Four hours to Chicago, ten to Zurich, and another to Venice. It took another to go through immigration, gather our bags and find the bus to the island.

Next we has to find the right boat stop to get us closer to our check in hotel. The boats hold a couple hundred people and run every few minutes in both directions. You have to make sure you are at the right place, get on the right boat, and be ready to abandon ship at the right place. (So far we've been doing pretty well in the boat department.)

The walking around in the street department is another story, or as Monty Python said, "And now for something completely different."

Got of the boat about 5:00 for what should have been a 3 minute walk, but I forgot to print out the directions to the hotel and of course no phone or Internet access. So how hard could it be, we should be able to sniff out a hotel that's only three minutes away. Short version: 5:30. I would have loved to see our route on the My Tracks app. Like the Family Circle cartoon when he tracks one of the kids aimless walks through the neighborhood.

Once there they escorted us to where we are staying, which was another four minute walk. Of course these aren't smooth sidewalks, but cobble stones and many bridges over the smaller canals, which means up eight steps and down eight steps. Two bridges later, and 10 minutes ( he was pointing out things to navigate by that really didn't help and we just wanted a shower) we arrived at a big wooden door. He pulled out 2 keys on a ring with a faub.

The long key was for this door. Pretty dark inside and he led us up a step, around a corner, up a step, 20 feet then down a step, through a courtyard to another door. He held the faub to a deally-bob on the door and 4 bolts ground open. Then up 20 steps to a small landing to our room opened by the third key. I was beginning to wonder if Venice was really as safe as he said earlier to me about walking around.

There are only four rooms on the floor. The room is good sized, about 14x 14 with one wall all windows overlooking a small canal. Fair size bathroom with a large shower. Our own balcony that we can actually squeeze in two chairs and sit, but it's been too warm to do that for long. Most important, good air conditioning that had been turned on for us!

I found a small supermarket. Four isles, but had everything. Amazingly I found my way back. Up until then I was about to return my navigation merit badge!

Went to bed without any tv, but woke at 2 and couldn't sleep, so got out the iPad and some chips and woke up Pam. I found a web site for a walking tour and signed us up for the next evening. I was up again at 6 so I got dressed to go explore for an hour or so.

It took me almost an hour to find St. Mark's Plaza that is only two blocks away for our hotel. Saw some cool things though and empty streets. The plaza was almost deserted and had a nice sunrise and I took lots of pictures.

I left there about 7:30 and took the bus up to the train station to make a reservation for our exit, as advised by the Jones travel expert. Arrived there 50 minutes later and was told it is open seating and no reservations are accepted. Back on the boat for a few stops and back to the room by 8:30.

Pam was still sleeping because something / someone kept her up all night. We had breakfast right outside our door. Rolls, cereal, juice, coffee, fruit ham and cheese. Being a satellite of the other palace, ours starts at 8:30 while their's is an hour earlier.

Went to St. Mark's and did the tourist things. A museum, the palace, rode the bus up the Grand Canal. Had ice cream cones for lunch and went to the coolness of the room.

I wanted to be able to find the place were supposed to meet for the walking tour, so I tried firing up our European gps, but it just showed a Suncadia map. So I emailed the man I bought it from to ask how to make it work. He is in China, but responded promptly to his 'good friend', me. Turns out I needed a place where it could find more than two satellites.

I plugged in the place where we needed to be and it showed us the way until we started walking down the streets that were never wider than eight feet. Anyway we found the spot and after fifteen minutes our group of 12 were ready to visit some local bars for wine and snacks.

It was a fun group all about our age. A couple from London, Australia, two from Dallas, each with a daughter, and us. Four different bars where the locals hung out and you could tell by the looks we were getting. "What are these people doing here?"

Our young guide was explaining the different toppings on the snacks and just said this one is meat. I asked what kind of meat and she responded that it was human meat. It went down hill from there.

At the next to the last stop some guy walked in and the London couple were in shock. It was a guy that produced a BBC documentary on Venice. They were whispering and said his show was what made them come to Venice. I said well go tell him. They finally got up the nerve and he was very gracious and posed for a picture. Another couple also saw his show and got a picture. Look up Francesco da Mosto on YouTube.

Today, Friday, we walked for an hour at 7:00. Had breakfast then at 10:00 took a tour to the island of Murano that is famous for it's glass. Private water taxi that is like a limousine if it had wheels. All paid for by the factory, and recommended by the hotel, so I was prepared for the time share sales pitch. It was interesting and Pam had instructions to buy something expensive for Laura, and she did, so we got out of there with no financial injuries.

Took the boat out about 30 minutes to another island that was much more secluded. Had a nice, big lunch and walked around. Out there the buses only run every half hour. Got back to the room by 3:30 to cool off. After a cool shower and a quick trip to the market, we had a drink on the balcony and waved at all the gondolas that passed by.

Went out for an ice cream dinner since lunch was so big. We will leave here at 7:30 and go to the other hotel for breakfast as we leave by train at 9:45 for Portoroz.

Hope all is well with all of you.