Monday, September 26, 2011

More Venice, Gondolas, and Beach at Lido

Raelene here again. We got up early today, had breakfast at our hotel, checked out and stowed our packs for the day at the hotel front desk. The plan today involves catching a night train to Vienna so we had only one night in Venice.

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Rialto Bridge

We walked to Rialto bridge and went shopping in the outdoor markets. We walked by an outdoor cafe that had some delicious smelling and looking lasagna. It was an expensive spot because it was right on the Grand Canal that had a cover charge as well but the lasagna and water was delicious. We savoured it.
After wandering and contemplating, we decided to splurge and take a gondola ride. It also was expensive but an experience I will always remember with no regrets. It was quite peaceful compared to the starting and stopping of the water bus. We asked our gondolier how many canals were in Venice, which if I recall correctly he said 550 canals... and 520 bridges. It was impressive the way the gondolier navigated the long boat into narrow canal passageways without rubbing anything but he said he's been doing this for 33 years so he has had some practice. Oh, and a gondola runs around $40,000 euros so that's another good reason not to bump into anything.

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When I was looking at glass objects in a little shop, the friendly shop owner told us about it being a perfect day to go to the nearby Lido island with a large beach facing the Adriatic. Our water bus tickets that we already had would get us there in 45 minutes so we hopped on and went to check it out. We walked across the narrow island, took off our shoes to walk in the sand and water, snapping a couple photos as the sun was getting lower in the sky.

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Beach at Lido

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It would have been great to have had a beach day here, the sand and weather was great, but we had a prepaid reservation on a train to catch so headed back towards the water bus dock. On the way, we grabbed some pizza and wine at the beach town street side restaurant. Back at our Ca d'Oro area, we had some gelati and sat for a few moments at our hotel terrace that had been right outside our hotel room door before grabbing our packs to head overnight on a train to Vienna.

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