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For our morning we caught the vaporetto down to the end of the canal to Salute, and started our walk from there. We meandered through the laneways back towards Academia – past the Peggy Gugenheim museum, but it wasn’t open 🙁 .

Crossed the canal at the Academia bridge and slowly wandered our way back towards the Rialto bridge area, only did a loop once when we got to far into residential back lanes.

Back over the bridge to home area and grabbed some pizza slices to take back for lunch.

Nerida and I then headed back for an afternoon walk leaving Dana behind as she was in need of a rest. First goal was to find a birthday present for BJ and mission accomplished nice and quick. We then wandered – and yes there is a lot of just walking in Venice, but its a pleasant strolling pace – till we hit the Lagoon near San Marco. We hoped onto the water bus back up the canal, getting off at San Toma, nearish home.

A short walk into the Campo and we found the most amazing mask shop here. Many (most) of the shops seem to sell the same mass produced masks, but there are a few that still have hand made ones – and these were some of the best we have seen. We are still trying to work out how we can get home – but will return with Dana on Wednesday to look at them.

We then headed towards Rialto once more and walked till we found familiar shops/streets and knew we were near home. Stopped for some pasteries for afternoon tea, as well as getting some cool watermelon and retuned home.

After some food we had a couple of games of Fusbal and Nerida and Dana managed to beat me. We then spent a couple of hours relaxing as we had an evening walking tour and gondola ride booked. Back onto the vaporetto and down to Academia for the starting point for 6:30 – walking through an area we hadn’t (mostly) done yet. Then onto a Gondola at 8pm for about a 35 minute ride – across the grand canal, then through some of the small canals.

Back home at 9pm and finally off to dinner – we are starting to go native with our eating hours. Went round to place called The Jazz Club just around the back of our building that was recommended by Rosa our host. The pizza were really good as was the wine.

We say our first rat of Venice go scurrying past – which we thought was amusing, but an American family at another table seemed a bit more concerned.

While we were easting a local came past walking for dog and cat – and yes the cat was happily walking along with her and dog , neither on leads. Though the cat wasn’t happy with another dog that was already at the resturant that from it’s barking didn’t like cats.

A few minutes later she returned from her walk and settled into the cafe with the group with the dog and her dog came and befriended us – given we’d dropped a bit of pizza and Nerida fed it the ham 😉 .

Wednesday will be another day of just exploring – before we leave Thursday for Florence and given the current weather pattern getting seriusly baked with temperatures expected in the high 30’s for the days we are there.

 

We spent the morning wandering around Venice getting our bearings (ha) and working out where our tour was leaving in the afternoon from over near San Marco. The crowds are thick and people just keep stoping and walking backwards without looking where they are going.

The queues for the Basilica and tower at San Marco are as long (if not longer) than what we saw in Paris for Louvre and Eiffel tower. The square was also full of hawkers trying to sell selfie sticks to everyone – including those with “real” camera’s around our necks.

Found our statue of “man on horse back” for tour, so caught the vaporetto back to Rialto Mercator station to have lunch and freshen up. Wandered around for a bit to find something we wanted to eat and settled on some pizza slices from a place just around the corner. Nerida and Dana had ham and pineapple, and I had ham and mushroom. Really thick base – more like foccacia, but really good.

Back to the apartment to freshen up and have some fruit we brought on way back – then off for tour.

A short walk fro statue to our boat then a 20 minute trip to Murano and the glass factory. We watched a demonstration of making a glass decanter / jug, then a horse. the master doing the work was amazing with how quick we worked teh galss into shape.

Into the gallery / showroom for a good look, really amazing works. The guide who talked us through the glass blowing stuck with us for a while showing us various things as I think he worked out that Nerida was going to spend. However he wandered off just at the wrong moment and we hooked up with a new guide who noticed my tee shirt (shave the whales one) and we started chatting and he worked out we were Australian and he is planning a trip to Australia next year – and we just clicked talking. He was then really pleased when we picked a rmapant horse piece with amazing colouring in it – just don’t ask how much even with the tour discount applied. Nerida also picked up a beautiful pendant that happened to be in a similar style.

Back onto the boat and off to Burano – not overly interested in the lace (any of us) but the houses are amazing – each being a different colour. After a wander around back to the boat for the trip back.

Dropped the bags back then out for dinner, picking a small restaurant just down a lane from us. Really nice food – I had grilled cuttlefish, and Dana (yet another) pizza. For “house” wine in a carafe it was pretty damn good and light, just perfect for the weather.

Another wander and grabbed some ice creames for desert – well frozen yogurt for Dana, gelato for me and ice cream for Nerida to be precise. Back home and another game of Fusbol and Dana and I beat Nerida.

 

No problems with Italian trains in getting to Venice. A four and a half hour train ride across the north of Italy went pretty smoothly, barring me nearly missing it leaving early grabbing some snacks. Nerida was about to have kittens.

Train was pretty empty at the start, but filled up a bit at Milan, including a group of five young kids off on a school camp (?) who ended sitting beside us 🙁 . They were on the train for the next couple of hours through to the second last stop.

We actually had our tickets checked (twice) on the train – but still no gates or anything at the stations themselves.

Arriving at Vencie itself and it was pretty chaotic trying to find our way through. Got tickets for the water bus system and found our wharf – fighting off the porter who wanted to take my bag. One short boat ride later and we met Rosa at the Rialto Mercator wharf and she walked us (twisting and turning) to the apartment. A small issue in that the previous guests had broken the espresso machine, but Rosa rang her husband to bring a spare one over straight away when we said we were coffee drinkers.

The place is lovely – looks like it was fully renovated sometime in the last couple of years – new floors, doors – everything. We are on the first floor, and ground floor is just an entry foyer with our Fusbol table.

A quick settle in and shower – then out for a wander and dinner. Stopped at one of the resturants on the Grand Canal just below the Rialto Bridge and had pasta of different types. Dana had spaghetti with meat sauce, I had spaghetti with clams and Nerida gnocchi with quatro fromagio. We also had desset to celebrate eating out for dinner for the first time. Nerida and Dana shared wicked looking chocolate icecream and I had tiramisu.

We then wandered the streets to walk off dinner and got thoroughly lost. Eventually found our way back as dusk settled in and the street lights started coming on.

One game of Fusbol later – victory to me over a team of two 😉 and time to turn in for the night. Tomorrow we have a free morning, then off to Murano and Burano islands in the afternoon on a tour. Expect to be much poorer this evening 🙁 .

Have decided that we will take a quiet relax for a couple of hours in Turin and not go for a short wander as I think we are all a bit exhausted after wandering through Provence in the heat the last week.

We have a 1pm train and don’t have to check out till noon, with a ~1km walk straight down the road to the station for the train to Venice.  In theory we could catch the tram down 1 stop – but kind of seems pointless as we’d then also have to work out where to get a ticket from as quick online checks says you can;t purchase on them.

 

A day of travelling from Avignon to Turin via Lyon by trains.

The morning was spent having a last wander aroud Avignon for a last time and doing some shopping. Lunch was at a Tunisian resturant in the main square – which almost seemed like home cooking while on holidays as it is style Nerida likes to cook with. Was damn good food.

Then the hunt for a petrol station to fill the car before returning it. Avignon station was busy with lots of people and bags transiting like us – though damn warm as it was meant to be 36 in Avignon on Saturday. Train got in on time and we had to hump our bags upstairs as it was a double decker train. Seemed a bit odd that there were no barriers / ticket checks at Avignon and none again on the train, nor at Lyon when we got off. A big difference to the gate mentallity at home.

Unfortunately our connecting train at Lyon was delayed by 30 minutes, so we had a longer wait than desired. Apparently the train had technical issues before leaving Paris – and I think it still wasn’t well during the trip as we stopped for longer than expected at a couple of stops and seemed to be on a go slow at times. We lost anothert 15/20 minutes by the time we hit Turin.

Going through the Alp’s was spectacular – and it would be good to come spend more time here on a future holiday.

A “short” 500m walk from train station to our hotel (not worth a taxi really) and we have been “upgraded”  to dual rooms – so Dana can have silence from our snoring 😉 . We ordered a pizza and fruit in for a very late dinner, then off to bed.