Day 3: All the Canals are Picturesque

Note: Our hotel only gives us one hour of Wifi a day … so this is a partial post that will be updated later :)

In preparing for this trip, a few of the guidebooks said things like “it’s not what you see when you are in Venice, it’s just being there”. I’d have to agree with them completely.

After a long first two days of travel, today we woke up at 8:30 AM in our hotel Ca’ Zose – which is not late by any standards …. but just delayed for a trip with Kerrianne and I. We tend to wake up early to beat the crowds to breakfast and start knocking sites off of our list. However, our bodies clearly needed sleep and according to my Jawbone Up tracker, we slept for over 9 hours. You’re welcome body.

One of the best parts of travelling with Kerrianne is that she likes to be prepared before we venture out for the day. So before we left our hotel, we had downloaded a Rick Steve’s audio tour of St. Mark’s Square, marked off our map for spots to visit, and already planned our next meal. We both need to be fed at regular intervals or the shit hits the fan. It gets ugly.

If it was to try and draw on a map today were we went it would probably look like I dropped a pile of spaghetti. I have no idea where we walked but I can say with certainty that we crossed a whole bunch of canals and they were all beautiful. After two days in Venice, we’ve really covered the majority of the places / neighborhoods / recommended walks. We didn’t hit up the “ghetto” but I’m pretty sure our parents would be fine with that. BTW, the “ghetto” isn’t a ghetto anymore but more of a reference to it being the first Jewish neighborhood.
 

Here’s how today shaped up.

St. Mark’s Plaza & Church & Bridge of Sighs
St. Mark’s square and church was interesting and one of those things that I guess you just have to see – but personally, I preferred our little jaunt to Santa  Maria Gloriosa del Frari better.
  • Went inside and fought off gaggles of tourists. I’m sorry but if you are walking around taking pictures with your iPad you are ridiculous … in all languages and cultures.
  •  We didn’t pay extra to see any of the special little things or to go into the Bell Tower. Saved cash money for our prosecco budget.
The best part of the Bridge of Sighs is its name. Essentially, in the olden days (technical term) it was the bridge prisoners crossed before going to jail. So the view from the bridge was the last time they saw Venice … and theoretically sighed. Get it?



Snack Time
After the morning tourist activities, we decided we needed a coffee break. Obviously. So we took in a little café called Tiziano Sas where we leisurely sipped some caffeine and read about other sites. At this point, we realized that we had walked a lot further than we thought we did and were a lot closer to the Rialto Bridge. Hello good fortune.
 

Rialto Bridge
The Rialto bridge was interesting and offered great views of the Grand Canal – but perhaps the best part for Kerrianne was when some old South American men thought she was Spanish. Bonus? After the bridge, Kerrianne spotted a cat from about 50 yards away down an alley. They were fast friends and don’t fret we have video of the entire thing.
 

Pizza Time
When we get hungry, we get less decisive. I’m not sure why but that’s how it works. So we wandered for a fare bit of time before finally deciding on lunch at Bar Archivio. We were initially opposed to place that appeared to have a cactus in its logo – but they left pictures of their food off the menu, so that won us over. Plus there was “no coverto”. Otherwise known as “cover charge”. We hate those.
 
This pizza was so tasty. It didn’t hurt that we consumed it with prosecco. And, we had a view of a canal and a church all at the same time. Life is tough.

Santa Maria Gloriosa del Frari
Kerrianne had marked this place off on our map as a to-do but we literally stumbled onto it after pizza. It was the church that was directly across from the pizza place. Kerrianne had wanted to see it because there was some famous artist’s work inside, Titian. I’m not an “art person”, I’m a “sit on the bench while you look at art person”. That being said, this church was gorgeous and filled with beautiful art and sculpture. You aren’t supposed to take pictures – so close your eyes and pretend you don’t see these ones that we took.
 
In keeping with family tradition, we also lit a candle near this statue of Mary that was covered in little pictures. I’d love to know what this all meant, but Santa Maria has not bowed to all the tourists here and translated any of their signs to English.
*TBD* Dinner

*TBD* St. Mark’s Square at NIGHT

Tomorrow? We are leaving Venice and making our way to Florence by train! But before we do that, we’ll demolish another hotel breakfast complete with “Cocoa Fantasia” … which is essentially nutella. I now want to call all chocolate spreads fantasy chocolate.

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