Venice!!! Finally There!!!

I have long dreamed of someday visiting this city. As with many others the idea of a city rising up from the water is a fascinating and almost entrancing concept. Well, I am here now, and I can safely say that I am both fascinated and entranced by this city.

The "streets" are narrow, so narrow in some places that two people passing must turn sideways. There is no way you can walk in a straight line to where you are going, there are so many twists and turns that it would be easy to get lost. Even the "main streets", the ones leading from the Rialto Bridge to Piazza San Marco, are convoluted and just as twisty and tiny as the rest.

To get around, one must either plan a route meticulously with a map, and follow their progress at every turning, or just set off in the general direction, and let your intuition guide you. I prefer the second method, and it seemed to work last night, although it was not always the fastest path we took.

We stepped off the train at 4.30, and arrived in a station that looks exactly like every other station in europe, but, when we stepped outside, we were definitely not in just any city.

We stepped out onto a piazza that ended in steps going down to the taxis, in this case, boats. It was soooo cool.

We asked one of the taxi drivers how much it would be to our hotel, and it was going to be about 40 euros, so we decided to walk. If we had known where we were going, we would have made it there in about 10 mins.

It is so beautiful in a completely unique way.

 As it turns out, we ended up in the right place, but we had drawn the little dot of where the hotel is on the wrong side of a little bridge. It never even occurred to us to check over there, and after a while of looking decided to call the hotel for directions.

After mistakenly calling the hotel in Florence, where the guy was understandably confused, we got a hold of the hotel in Venice, and the guy came out the door and called us over.

It is a very nice hotel, again, a B&B thing too.

Here is my room, which was for once, actually like the one on the website!

After a quick rest, we went out for pizza nearby, then walked to Piazza San Marco. On the way we passed over the Rialto Bridge, and the view from it is amazing.

That second picture is the one street in Venice, however it does not really lead anywhere as we found out later.

We found our way to the piazza, aided every once and a while by the signs leading the way. It is a beautiful square, even though a few of the buildings are covered up with scaffolding for repairs.

We walked back over the Rialto Bridge, and stopped at an osteria for an aperitivo. Soon, being tired, we wound our way back to the hotel, taking a long, but easy route back through the piazza where we had eaten.

This morning, as I am typing this, see this out my window.

It is so amazing that I am actually here. It is one year almost to the day that I decided to come to europe, and here I am, in this ancient city, eating breakfast served in my room.

Looking out the window, there is a bridge I can see, that looks in the picture, like there is some distortion of the view going on, but no, it is just like that.

None of the bridges here are straight. They all angle to the next gap in the buildings, or morph out to lead to a doorway or two, or even seemingly lead nowhere at all.

I love this city already, and am going to go out and explore some more, take my camera for a walk, and see what I can find.