August the 22nd was not a very blogworthy day so we thought we'd briefly mention it here instead. The only photo we took was of the loud, drunk Contiki bunch at our camp site bar as we were enjoying the fact we weren't part of that ;) Otherwise it was a day of travelling from Salzburg to Venice with our most exciting outing being a trip to the supermarket.

So onto Venice. I think the best word to describe our initial impression was HOT! We were greeted at the campsite by a number of men walking around in their undies (apparently it's the in thing to do). The minimum was 25 degrees and the maximum was 36 with high humidity so we nearly joined them ourselves.

After a quick run around a couple of places we bought our ferry tickets and were off to Venice (we camped on the mainland). Thanks to advice from my colleagues we got an all day pass on the vaporetto (ferries) within Venice which was fantastic.

Venice is a beautiful city with its narrow, maze-like streets, plentiful canals and varying architectural styles. We took the self guided walking tour recommended by Lonely Planet which brought us off the 'main tourist drag'. We were taken to see lots of churches, the Jewish district, the north lagoon and lots of random little streets. It was cool to see something a bit different and a little of the way of life for those living in Venice. Although we've seen it in the movies and on TV it was amusing to see with our own eyes how they hang their washing out the window on the washing lines. Here's hoping they have really good pegs! Our walking tour finished up at Piazza San Marco ... the tourist mecca! We dutifully joined the queue to go inside St Marks and laughed at all the women who had to buy shawls to drape around their shoulders or larger ones to put around their legs because their clothes were 'inappropriate'. Thankfully Di had warned us so I made sure I had a top to put on to cover my shoulders. The church itself didn't disappoint. It was VERY impressive with its intricately painted ceilings, mosaics and sculptures. No cameras allowed in, so sadly nothing for the blog either.

About this point we were rather hot so went to find ourselves a gelato (not that it is hard to find a gelato shop over here). Yummmmmmm! Even Movenpick ice cream can't beat an Italian gelato.

Based on more advice from colleagues, we hopped onto the number 1 vaporetto and rode the loop which included the entire Grande Canale. Being one of the main tourist attractions it was very well maintained and full of gondolas.

The day was fading so we made our last stop the island of Burano. This was probably our favourite spot in the Venice area. It's a fishing village and when the fog set in the sailors struggled to find their house. So, each house was painted a different colour to help the sailors find the right home and people are still maintaining that tradition. It results in a stunningly bright township which is a nice change from the grey we've seen a lot of. Here we also got to see 'real Italian life' with the ladies all sitting outside each other's houses having a chat, the men drinking goodness-knows-what together at the pub and some old guy randomly starting to sing as he's sitting at a restaurant. We liked it so much here we decided to skip Murano (the glass making island) and have a proper look around.

So we eventually arrived back at the campsite after 9pm but had the most fantastic day.

- Rebecca

Brett's Venice by the numbers:

- 149 churches

- 177 canals

- 409 bridges

- 36 degrees maximum

- 2 litres of liquid consumed by each of us

- 0 trips to the toilet