Venice

Venice is a completely magical city.  It was the best place to wander. You could take a side street and instantly be lost in tiny alleyways that winded around old apartment buildings. Collin and I joked that even if we had months to discover Venice we would never be able to walk down every street. There were just so many of them! Venice is comprised of 118 separate islands. When it was first created, Venice was originally a swamp. Refugees running from barbarians used wood slats to build the foundation for Venice. This being said, most of Venice is still sitting on top of the original foundation from thousands of years ago!! Within the last 100 years however, Venice has sank 9 inches down!!! One last fun fact, Venice has over 25 million people visit a year, which has people questioning if people should be required to get a special pass to be able to visit, in order to protect the city. 

We took an overnight train from Salzburg to Venice. That was an interesting experience. Since it was an extra €160 for a sleeping car Collin and I were in the peasant quarters. When we got to our designated spot we found that someone had taken our two seats and was already dead asleep. Another lady was sprawled out by the door to our compartment and refused to move when we were trying to get inside. So Collin and I were wedged between an Asian and some crazy rude lady. We ended up sleeping sandwiched between the two of them practically on top of one another so we didn’t get in the space of the other two people. However, that didn’t stop them from getting into our space😡 it was a very funny experience and now we know that the extra euros is worth a sleeping compartment! 

We stayed in this cute little camp ground in a tiny cabin. It was only a few minutes from Venice and had everything we needed.

The first morning we were there we stopped at a little café and ordered espresso and pastries. It was so amazingly delicious we decided to go back every morning we were there. The second time we went in the woman behind the counter remembered us and our order!! The last day we stopped there before our train and sadly the lady wasn’t working, but her coworker remembered us too! 

We spent most of the days just wandering the streets of Venice and eating food. We went to the bridge of sighs, Saint Marco’s plaza, and saw the house where the explorer Marco Polo was from. There were so many tourists at some of these locations that I enjoyed seeing the random back streets more so than having to fight through all the people. I also could not believe how expensive a gondola ride was!! It was €80 for half an hour!! We would have loved to enjoyed the experience of a gondola ride but our poor college graduate selves were not about to pay that much. 

Needless to say, we had a beautiful time!