We Open In Venice...

By Wednesday afternoon, I was more than ready to leave Florence and move on to Venice. And Venice didn't disappoint. Coming in on the train, I was greeted with a beautiful view out over the water.

Sun setting over the water

Little canals!

More sunset

BIG SHIP

When I got to Venice, I had to navigate their public transportation system--a system of boats that essentially operated like buses. According to my hostel, I had to take either the 2, 4.1, or 4.2 boat from the train station, and the ticket lady told me to take the 4.1 as it would be faster. Well, I didn't realize that multiple boats came into the same port/dock/things, so when I got to the port, a boat was already there and people were loading on. I was like, "Oh, what luck!" and hopped right on. About 3 stops in, I see a sign across the canal announcing the "Ostello de Venezia" (my hostel). I was like, "Awesome, we're here!" but then the boat kept going. And going. And going. Eventually, I got off the boat on Lido Island, and got lucky as there was a boat going back to the stop I needed in about 5 minutes. So getting to the hostel took about an hour and a half, when it should have taken maybe 40 minutes... Oops.

Wednesday night, I did my ritual trip to Hard Rock Café and met a nice couple from California who helped me get un-lost looking for San Marco's Square. I'm not even sure I can explain how beautiful Venice is. That first night, I was pretty much just bowled over. I hate to say this, but Venice is probably 10 times more beautiful than Paris.

Thursday morning, I got a little bit of a late start (I just got lazier and lazier the further I got into this trip), but I headed out to Verona anyway. Verona turned out to be even more beautiful than I thought it would be. It was an awesome city (bigger than I thought it would be), and I pretty much wandered the whole day. My main objective was to send a letter to Juliet (which apparently you can also do through the actual mail), so I headed over to Juliet's House first and got tons of pictures of the Wall of Love, Juliet's Balcony, and the statue of Juliet--whose right breast apparently brings good luck when rubbed (so yes, I fondled the statue...)

Yeah, Roman guy just sitting around texting (also, you could see his underpants)

Wall of Love

The Courtyard

Juliet's Mailbox (waiting for my letter back!)

Statue of Juliet

Fondling the statue of Juliet *classy*

After dropping my letter in Juliet's mailbox, I totally bought a padlock and was a shameless tourist in locking my padlock onto the garden gate. I decided not to go into Juliet's House since apparently the main attraction was girls standing on Juliet's Balcony while their boyfriends stood in the courtyard and took pictures. So I headed over to Juliet's tomb instead where I found you could buy a discounted ticket for both her tomb and her house, so I bought the dual ticket and did both.

Love Lock

On the garden gate <3

Statue for the Asian Romeo and Juliet

Juliet's Tomb

 

At Juliet's House I ended up getting one of the workers to get a picture of me on the balcony, so that was an epic win. Then I dragged my aching feet back to the train station and back to Venice.

On Juliet's balcony--like a boss. :)

 

Friday morning, I got a glimpse of the president of Italy in San Marco's Square as he drove in to celebrate something about the 31st anniversary of the naval academy in Venice (I think). Then I took myself on a romantic gondola ride. Not going to lie--it was pretty awesome; expensive, but awesome.  Then I wandered around, did a little shopping, and got a little lost before heading back to the hostel.

Christiano--my Gondolier! (Don't worry mom, I got plenty of video)

 

Saturday morning, I met one of my roommates who was from Canada and we decided to head over to the Gallery of Academia together. The Gallery was a little disappointing--full of creepy religious paintings. Seriously, I lost track of how many creepy baby Jesus' there were. There was also a portrait of this woman who looked scarily like Scarlett Johansson. O_o

Is Jesus fondling her halo?

*judging you*

SCARJO???

 

We also ran into some people promoting an opera for that night, so we bought tickets, and then headed over to Santa Maria della Salute (a church that my gondolier had recommended). After all the creepy religious paintings, we weren't really in a church mood, so then we headed over to San Marco's Square to get lunch and then she left to go see the Dali exhibit and I went off to wander (of course). After wandering for a while, I went back to the hostel to pack and change.

There was a couple getting married, so I thought I'd join in on the celebration and take a photo

GPOY

I'm on a boat. xD

 

The opera last night was really nice. It was a little bit hard to see, but the music was just beautiful and it was just really fun to see. Sidenote: on the boat over to the opera, we saw this lady who had like the WORST weave ever and we were just like, "OMG, what is she thinking??!" My only thought was, "Maybe she's in the opera, that would make sense". Turns out--she WAS in the opera! The second she walked on-stage, I was just like, "Holy crap! It's bad weave lady!!" So yeah, that was amusing.

Out to dinner-- the cheese hamburger (as opposed to the cheeseburger)

This daring little fellow was adorable!

Got a bird in my hand!

After the opera, taking photos

Waiting for the boat in style