Venice was breathtaking. Our time spent there was like a dream and I never wanted it to end. In retrospect I was pretty unprepared for this trip, but somehow everything worked out perfectly. Luckily Gabby was there to show us around.
Our flight left Sevilla bright and early on Friday morning. I rode a bike to Puerta de Jerez at 4am to meet the girls I was going on the trip with. Four in the morning is still early in the night for most Spaniards going out on a Thursday night. As I was trying not to fall off of the bike from sleep deprivation, people were still partying on into the night. Taxis were still waiting in droves to take people home from the bars and so we had no problem finding one to take us to the airport. We flew with RyanAir, an airline known for being cheap, cheap, cheap... as long as they don't trap you into the extra fees they're notorious for adding on. But we all did a good job of packing light. There was no way any of us was going to pay the extra 60 euro they can tack on if your carry-on is too big or the 40 euro they charge if you forget to print out your boarding pass ahead of time.
Two and half hours later we landed (very roughly) in Italy! As I said before, I wasn't very well prepared for this trip. I knew Gabby planned to pick us up from the airport and that she knew what time, but I had no way of contacting her. I hadn't thought ahead of time to find out what phone number she was using or if my phone would even work in a different country. Luckily, we only had a few minutes of sitting in the airport wondering how on Earth we would find Gabby before she walked in. She got us on the right bus and headed toward Venice. The bus ride took about an hour (one of the reasons RyanAir is so cheap is because they don't fly you directly into the city) and I was passed out for almost the entire ride.
After getting off the bus we switched modes of transportation again. Vaporetto (aka the water-bus) this time. Gabby got us to the right dock and then had to go say goodbye to a friend who was leaving Venice. We got off the vaporetto in Academia and found our hostel surprisingly easily. We were all surprised when we were told we would have our own apartment. We had a room with a nice loft all to ourselves. I slept right next to the little window looking out at all of the rooftops. I felt kind of like Heidi, which is strange considering I was nowhere near the Alps. The breakfast at the hostel left much to be desired but at least they gave us a nice cup of coffee in the morning!
Saturday morning we met Gabby at the wooden bridge in Academia. Called Ponte dell'Accademia, this bridge is one of the four that stretch the entire way across the Grand Canal. After more coffee and pastries in one of the cafes she took us to Piazza San Marco. We took lots of pictures and stayed clear of the pigeons. It was a whirlwind of a day, but we saw almost all of the famous parts of Venice. We went to the Rialto bridge (one of the other bridges spanning the Grand Canal), took a gondola ride, saw the Jewish ghetto, and went to Burano (a colorful island off the coast). We ate lots of pizza and gelato and had an all around good time. That night we went to dinner with one of Gabby's friends, Lea, who is from Croatia but studying in Venice.
Gabby took a flight home early the next morning. Two of the other girls wanted to sleep in, so Lisa and I went by ourselves to the Peggy Guggenheim Museum. Her collection has paintings by Picasso, Miró, Magritte, Max Ernst (Peggy was once married to him), Dalí, Jackson Pollack, Braque, Duchamp, Kandinsky, and so many more. It was really cool to be able to see all of these paintings by modern artists that I had learned about in my Modern Art History class last semester. My favorite were the Cubist paintings by Picasso that we had talked so much about, Dalí's wild surrealist paintings, and Magritte's super dramatic surrealist paintings. The wishing tree in the garden, given by Yoko Ono to Peggy Guggenheim, was neat too. Lisa and I both wrote down wishes on small pieces of paper and hung them on the branches. That night Lisa and I went to Vivaldi concert at a concert hall really close to our hostel. They advertise the concert everywhere throughout Venice, and Lisa who is a music minor really wanted to go. We sat in the first row, just staring up at them in awe of their talent the entire time.
The next morning it was time to leave, bright and early once again. We woke up at 4am and made our way to the vaporetto, then the bus, plane back to Sevilla, bus into town from the airport, and then finally biked back to our apartments. It was a long day and I decided to sleep for the rest of the afternoon rather than go to class. It was nice to be back into the home-stay where we had home-cooked meals instead of eating another pizza (I lost count of how many pizzas I ate while we were there).
I get to do it all again starting tomorrow though! I'm going to Barcelona with Lisa, Molly, and Daniel and can't wait! And although it was nice to be back in Salud's apartment for a little while, I'm ready to leave again. Yesterday, I got yelled at for eating too much bread (it wasn't that much)! In Barcelona I plan on eating lots of paella, taking lots of pictures, and enjoying getting out of this apartment again.
Oh, and I made sure to get lots of pictures with me in them while in Venice, just like you requested Dad!
