Day 12:

So I woke up and ran right out the door to do a little daytime exploring of this confusing city. I started doing some blogging at a little, yet overpriced, internet café. On my way out of the internet café I realized that yesterday, with all its sun, had been luck, today was dreary, overcast, wet, and cold. I had to back track to my hotel and add my long sleeve shirt and raincoat to my sweater and t-shirt. I felt like I was back in the Alps.

I decided to head right to Piazza San Marco, because it seemed to be the big tourist draw of this small town (Venice only has 272,000 people who live here and it gets more that 15 million tourists each year), and because it was the only sight where numerous signs lead the way. After about 30 minutes of following the little yellow signs I made it to the Piazza where dirty birds attack friendly bird-feeding tourists. After spending a while taking some pictures of bird attacks, kids attacking birds, and other random bird/people battles, I wanted to go check out the rest of Venice.

I tried the route I took the night before to make it in the direction of the train station but after about 45 minutes of walking (when I thought I was in the right area!) I turned a corner and guess what? Piazza San Marco! Damn…. The second attempted escape of the Piazza I thought I’d try to outsmart the city and make a few new turns and I’d be back in the right area in no time. After about another 30 minutes of walking I start to look around and think, this looks familiar, so with hope in my heart I make another left, right into the west side of the Piazza! Double damn….

I won’t bore you with the third, fourth, and fifth tries to get away from the Piazza, but I will let you in on the good news! Somewhere in my Venetian wanderings I found 10 euro lying on the ground in an alley. Two points Rob! After about 4 hours of walking and learning the area quite well (just not well enough to escape) I gave up and found a water taxi/bus to take me to where I belong. I decided I needed a nap, one of these (I’m not sure what it was called but it was chocolaty, nutty, flaky and sugary, mmm…), and a nice night out.

For dinner I found a restaurant that served, guess what? Italian! I had a four course meal that consisted of tortellini with meat sauce, a salad, pork chop, fries, and tiramisu. Of course I chased this all down with a liter of vino della casa, which toward the end of the liter I managed to slop a little all over my placemat. Party-foul. I ended my meal by buying a rose from the roving vendor, to console myself for losing myself to San Marco and spilling wine. So far I think Italy may be getting the best of me, but it sure tastes great!

Day 11:

I was up and out the door of the hostel in Gryon by 8:47am this morning to grab a train to Venice, Italy. I am not sure how I motivated myself to actually leave, seeing how I was up till 4:30 am last night drinking and hanging out with all the new people that had showed up for the weekend. (Proof is in my last post, which I wrote sometime in the middle of my drunkenness). Anyways after spending most of the day on a train I arrived in Venice around 4 pm and set out to look for a hostel. Unfortunately Venice does not have a plethora of budget choices and of my two choices I had one Hostel that was full or a Nunnery (where nuns live) so I moved to option #3 a cheap budget hotel room (35 Euro/night). It is kind of a bummer not only being expensive but also after constantly having people around for the last 11 days I am suddenly alone. I am not sure how I motivated myself to actually leave, seeing how I was up till 4:30 am last night drinking and hanging out with all the new people that had showed up for the weekend. (Proof is in my last post, which I wrote sometime in the middle of my drunkenness). Anyways after spending most of the day on a train I arrived in Venice around 4 pm and set out to look for a hostel. Unfortunately Venice does not have a plethora of budget choices and of my two choices I had one Hostel that was full or a Nunnery (where nuns live) so I moved to option #3 a cheap budget (35 Euro/night). It is kind of a bummer not only being expensive but also after constantly having people around for the last 11 days I am suddenly alone.

Once I got settled in my room I ran out to get some pictures right before the sun went down. Spent about an hour wandering the train station area then after sunset I went back for a shower and a change of cloths. I spent the next three hours getting lost in Venice and eating mushroom calzones. Now people, when I say lost, I mean it, half the streets are 3 feet wide and dead ends. If you want to cross town you have to constantly backtrack and every single tourist has a map and looks completely lost, so I didn’t feel too bad, but at times it did play on my nerves when I was walking a narrow, deserted, dimly lit alley for a hundred yards at a time.