Venice Trip! Friday & Saturday

So, I made it back from Venice tiered and frozen but it was SO worth it! Friday was an early start for all of us. We left the villa in a bus at 6am so in order to get breakfast in, I was up around 5:30. We rode until we got to Sirimione, a little town on the way, in order to see the Grotte di Catullo. It is a huge area of Roman ruins and since one of our classes is about the Romans, it was made one of our stops. Needless to say a Roman ruin for an hour at 8:30 in the morning was not something we would willing choose. But soon enough we were back on the bus and on our way to Verona. I LOVED Verona! It was such a cool city. We saw a couple more Roman things (Can you tell this was a class trip??? Haha) but also went to see Juliet’s house from Romeo & Juliet! You can see the balcony and there is a statue of her underneath and you rub the right breast to have a life filled with love, so of course all of us did it :-) The coolest thing was in order to get to the house you had to walk through an alleyway that was covered in love letters from all over the world. People from everywhere write notes of current or lost loves and place them in the alley. It was really cool being able to read them – well the ones in English at least. After that we grabbed lunch and got back on the bus to make it to our final destination Venice.

By the time we got there it was getting dark so we couldn’t see too much of the city. We walked to our hotel that was conventently located right off of Saint Mark’s Square! It was a perfect location! We had dinner provided from the hotel that night and after dinner we all got together to check out the Venice nightlife. It didn’t take long for us to realize that there isn’t much of it haha apparently most people do not live on the actual island of Venice due to high costs so that means there isn’t much need for a “nightlife” especially during the off season. We found one bar and were told about a dance club which we misunderstood directions to. So, in the treck to find it, our group got split up and about 7 of us gave up and ended up at an empty bar for the night. It was actually a lot of fun though since it was only us…we started our own dance party :-) Once we left it had started to snow. It was really cold but absolutely beautiful to see everything covered in snow!

On Saturday we got up early and had breakfast before our entire group went to a few designated sites that pertain to our classes (both Roman and Venitian). After about an hour or so we were allowed to explore on our own which was really nice. A group of us went to the Gallerie dell’Accademia which is full of 18th century Renaissance art. It was neat to see but definitely not one of my favorite things we did during the day. Afterwards everyone wanted to grab some lunch but I instead opted to go to the Peggy Guggenheim Museum of Contemporary Art by myself. I splurged and got the recorder that tells you about each piece of art if you plug in the designated number, which was so worth it since I got to learn a little about each painting. That hour and a half was by far my favorite part of the trip! I got to see paintings by Picasso and my favorite (as all of you who have graduated for VT know), Jackson Pollock!

After I left the museum, I met Kate at the clock tower and we went to the top to see an amazing aerial view of all of Venice. It wasn’t as great as it could have been because it was pretty foggy but it gave us a good idea of what the city looked like. After that we went to the Doge’s Palace which was so cool! It is HUGE and is somewhat like how it would be to visit the White House except it included their version of the senate, the apartment of the Doge and the prisons! It was pretty unnerving being down there and walking the “Bridge of Sighs,” the bridge from the prison to the square where prisoners were executed. After that we got outside and it was sunny! We rushed over the clock tower and asked the guy collecting money if we could please go back up and he let us, so we got some good pictures (although it was still kind of foggy). From there, we checked out the Basilica which is just ridiculous. Not only is it gaudy from the outside, but the entire interior ceiling is covered with gold mosaic. It is pretty amazing to see, but it does seem like they just kept adding more and more stuff making it a bit over the top.

We took a break from sightseeing after visiting the main destinations throughout Venice and got to the good stuff…shopping! Venice is known for its blown glass so the stuff you could get was really neat. I got a few blown glass wine toppers and a bracelet AND everyone got masks for Carnivale! They are sold everywhere in Venice (since Venice has a HUGE Carnival). Everyone got one since most of us will be going to the one in Belinzona, mine is black and gold with a massive feather on the side. I am super excited to wear it! After shopping, a group of about 10 of us met at the hotel to get dinner. We ate along the Grand Canal and I had the best meal I have had here! (Spaghetti with Pesto-my fav) We went back to the hotel after to meet up with some other people and went to a Reggae bar that was close to our hotel – yeah, weird there would be a Reggae bar in Venice but the music was good! Unfortunately, while there people started getting sleepy and by 11:30 most people decided they wanted to go to bed. And then there were 5….

The 5 of us we determined to find something fun to do and by using Blackberrys to look up 'Venice Nightlife' we decided to find a place called Club Piccolo. It was about a 15 min walk to get to the section of the city it was in and somehow we stumbled upon a small sign that said Club Piccolo with a doorbell beneath it. We rang it and waited for about 30 seconds (while -we found out later- the owners inside were looking at us through a camera to see if they wanted to let us in haha). That exclusivity paired with the loud, American music pounding from the inside made us think that the 10 Euro + 1 Drink cover charge was worth it. We were wrong. Once we got inside there were about 5 people on the dance floor…and that’s it. Pretty funny to say the least! Luckily, it started to pick up around 1am and it ended up being so much fun! We were out until around 3:30 and then headed home in the snow/sleet. It was a late night.

We left early the next morning and stopped in Vincenza to see a few more site pertinent to our classes and got home around 5:00 Sunday night. Minus the boring school part, I had a really great time! No matter how terrible the weather is, Venice is absolutely amazing. This week should be pretty normal and I am planning on staying around Riva this weekend to take a little breather from crazy traveling but I may do a day trip to go snowboarding. I’ll make sure to update and let everyone know!! Love Love