The Long Road to Venice

Our day started a little after 4am today. Loved the prepaid cab service to Gare de Lyon (www.lecab.fr) - our car arrived 10 mins before the appointed hour, the service was super courteous, the confirmations were spot on. I totally recommend them. Our platform was not yet posted, so we lounged around while Talinn practiced some tunes on the piano at the station. Yes, there's a piano for personal relaxation and pleasure and passengers are welcome to play. The cafe was opening just in time to get our pain au chocolate, croissants and chocolate chaud fix. 

The 7 hour ride to Milan was super long. The countryside outside of Paris is dotted with little villages and corn fields. Four hours later we got into the mountains near Turin. The family sitting next to us were grandparents taking their three grand kids on a 10 day holiday to their house in the mountains. They were all planning to hike up there after getting off the train. Charming towns inhabit the valley and we saw many bicyclists.

Shortly afterwards we entered Italy. No immigration, no passport check. Rien. The colors changed to rustic mustards and oranges. Drying laundry festooned the village homes. At Milan, our destination was the garibaldi station but we had to catch our next train from Milan Centrale. Luckily, a man at the platform was helping people with questions and told us where to catch a local train to Milan Centrale. We had nearly an hour before our three hour ride to Venice. Unfortunately, there was no food to be found at the station, so we munched on our packed snacks and dreamt about a heavy Italian dinner. The train ride to Venice seemed much longer because we were tired and hungry. But suddenly out of the blue, there was water everywhere and we knew our destination was finally near!

Venice is something else! I was blown away the minute I stepped onto the grand canal from the Santa Lucia train station. The ten exhausting hours were wiped away in an instant! Venice is the height of touristy but you know why as soon as you see those 12th century beauties that line the grand canal. Each building is worthy of being photographed. We got on Vaporetto #1 to get to San Lorenzo station in the direction of San Marco.

BB was in a bit of a shock. I don't think he had expected this at all or anything close to it. He busted out his camera immediately and got busy during our journey through the Grand Canal. It was fascinating to watch our water bus pull into different stations on either side and the way the boat was anchored at each station with a rope. We had to make our way to la Fenice theater after we got off but we just stood there gazing with confusion at a choice of narrow alleys disappearing into surreptitious corners. Where to go? Help comes in many ways. A man nearly walked us all the way to our destination and even helped us with our luggage over the ubiquitous little bridges. All we could think of while following him was "how the heck are we going to make our way home each time we get out?"

Elisabetta was waiting for us outside the theater and checked us into our apartment situated right across. She was most excited to meet BB and gushed over him with a profusion of bambino related Italian adjectives. Our cute little one bedroom pad overlooked the theater square. The evening was super pleasant but we had only one thought on our minds - dinner! Elisabetta recommended a restaurant around the corner where we ordered two plates of pasta with gnocchi and wolfed it all down before you could say Italy. Talinn just LOVED the pasta drizzled with chili olive oil and the other plate with fresh pesto. 

We strolled out to the center of Venice - San Marco piazza. It is just as breathtaking as I remembered it to be, especially after all the lights came on. The onion domes of the basilica marking the far end of the vast square. What a long day but we were thrilled to be here. After a long warm shower. BB and I read in bed about the Doges of Venice and the history of Saint Mark's basilica. Ready for our first day in Venice!