4am arrived extremely quickly, not too surprising when you get to bed only 3 hours earlier. But up and at 'em were the three of us, as we had a 5am, 5.5 hour bus ride taking us from Pula, Croatia to Venice, Italy.
The ride was relatively uneventful aside from the stunning scenery racing past our windows as the Croatian sky melted away from a dark grey, to silver, to orangish-pink, and finally into the light blue of early morning.
By 10:30 we had arrived in Venice with very little idea of how to get to the hotel we had booked the night before. We were given some rather unconvincing instruction to take "Boat 2 and to get off at Per Rialto", and that was about it.
So, we did as we were told, and heaved our heavy backpacks aboard an extremely crowded canal boat and found ourselves approximately 10 sq cm to stand as the boat pushed off the pier. We shuffled off the boat after a 15 minute boat ride, which left our jaws scraping the floor as we took in the incredibly beautiful surroundings of Venice. We had hatched a plan to grab a cappuccino and hopefully free WI-FI in order to find the specific coordinates of Hotel Marconi, instead however, after crossing over the bridge we simply bumped into it 2 minutes into our mission... Perfect. Quite perfect actually, as the accommodation we chose, which was the least expensive we could find, was probably in the most ideal location in the entirety of Venice.
So we checked in to the hotel, but were about 3 hours too early to get to our room, so instead dropped our bags, put ourselves together a bit, and ventured out into the stunning late morning Venice had to offer. First stop... Coffee. We were a bit desperate given our early rise, so jumped at the first opportunity to sit along the canal sipping a cappuccino. That was the first and last time we would be taking our coffee anywhere in the near vicinity of this place, as €12 got us 2 small cappuccinos and a diet coke! Yikes.
The afternoon was filled with much site seeing, churches, many, many paintings of Jesus, and of course our obligatory shots of Fernet-Branca... Love Italy! :) Evening came quickly and we headed back to the hotel with the fading sun. At last we checked into our rooms and were finally granted our beloved pastime of dropping bags into the room and plopping down on the freshly made bed with a hefty sigh.
Comfy in our evening's accommodation, We took in some much needed r&r. We popped open a bottle of Croatian white wine left over from the previous night, as we chatted and half-watched Australia get pummeled by New Zealand in the Rubgy World Cup Quarter Finals. After mustering up the energy, we pried ourselves off the bed, cleaned ourselves up a bit, and make our way out into the Venetian night.
Earlier in the day I had spotted a restaurant that had peaked my interest, and so we had all agreed we would have dinner there, but as anyone who has been to Venice realizes it is quite easy to get lost in the many allies and canal ways that makes up Venice. And though I knew exactly what the restaurant looked like, I had little clue on how to make it back. So with the help of our trusty navigator; Ball aka Magellan, we retraced just about every step we had taken that afternoon and found ourselves at the doorstep of the long sought after restaurant, just as it had looked in my memory.
We were a little put off by the fact that there were only two other diners in the establishment, but decided to go for it anyway, we had come this far after all. And man, are we ever stoked we did. The restaurant quickly filled up with what we all believed to be 'locals' and we dined on amazing apps, pastas, and yummy Pinot Nevo. We enjoyed a long meal and after a couple hours payed up and headed out into the very cool, crisp, darkness.
We finished the night off with a long walk and a dipped into a couple establishments for that last (totally unnecessary) glass of wine, before retiring back to our quarters.
In the morning, after a late start and later checkout we headed out to take care of some business, namely finding a place to stay for the evening, getting a car rented for our trip out to Italy's Lake region, and figuring out how to get Linda to the airport that evening as it was her last day with us. So we hit up an Internet cafe and after 45 minutes felt pretty happy with ourselves for gettin 'er done. One last thing on the ole 'To Do' List, wait in the absurdly long line at the Italia Post to send off the postcards that we had been dragging all over Europe.
Approximately 45 minutes later, after being accosted by the grumpy woman behind the post desk, and after licking my 34th we figured what better way to compliment the thick, bitter, taste of postage stamp glue than a heaping scoop of Italian Gelato! Mmmm... So Yum!
Linda and I did a bit of shopping. And the three of us hiked through the two neighborhoods we had missed the previous day. As the day went on we were forced to seek shelter in a wine bar when our perfect Venice weather deteriorated into a misty-foggy rain. Never missing a beat, we seized the opportunity to entertain ourselves with what else, but a Euro Red Wine Blind Taste Test! And as most would suspect, I was the lone victor in choosing all correct wines! ;)
After an early dinner, we gathered our bags and made our way to the bus station. We were to say 'goodbye' to our wonderful and lovely travel buddy Linda as she continued onto Marco Polo International airport, and we were to check into our accomodation close to the airport for an early morning departure to Italy's Lake Region. Thanks so much Linda for meeting up. Venice, Such a good time!