This weekend I stayed in Florence, except for Saturday which I spent in Venice with my roommate Shannon. Friday we started the day at our favorite panini shop and then went shopping in the market and bought some gifts, then we attempted to go to the Boboli Gardens, an outdoor museum that is about a 30 minute walk from the Duomo and is suppose to be beautiful. It was sunny and 70 degrees on Friday so we thought it would be perfect! But we got there and they had closed already! It was only 4:30 so we were really bummed. But we slowly strolled home and enjoyed the sunset anyway. I have found that no matter where you are in the city, sunset is the most beautiful time of day. The colors of the brick and stone and orange, yellow, red, and beige paint that covers the walls and buildings around the city seem to intensely illuminate from the minute the sun starts to set until all the light has gone. It's almost indescribable... so beautiful. It kind of reminds me of the Arizona desert sunsets we see in Paradise Valley, and makes me miss them a little bit! But that's not a problem considering I only have about 5 weeks left in Italy. Where has the time gone?! I can't believe it. The whole thing feels like a dream.
Saturday Shannon and I left for venice at 8:00 am from the Santa Maria Novella train station, by bus with a student travel group. We were going to try to explore Venice by ourselves, but friends that visited the city a few weeks ago said it would be smart to go with a tour group because Venice was pretty tricky. Now I know what they were talking about.. getting around Venice alone would be impossible! When we arrived, we went straight to the first water taxi station, similar to a bus stop, but different because they have no streets in Venice! I always knew that Venice was the city of water canals, but I didn't know that they literally have no streets, no cars, no stoplights, nothing. It's all water. The police, ambulance, firemen, taxis: all boats. It was insane! I was so confused. We hopped on a boat that took us down the grand canal, the biggest canal in the city, and to the Piazza San Marco where the Basilica of San Marco is. Piazza San Marco is one of the most famous piazza's in Europe and the only piazza in Venice, all the rest are called 'campi'. Piazza San Marco is the piazza with tons and TONS of gross pigeons that aren't afraid to waddle right up to you and peck at your feet and even land on people with food. What's more gross is that people let the pigeons crawl all over them! So weird. However, Shannon was really excited to see all the pigeons and mess with them so we took some action shots of us running through the crowds of 100s of pigeons. After, we toured the piazza and saw a glassblowing demonstration and them roamed around on our own. Glass is what Venice and a nearby island, Murano, are known for. There are over 2,000 hues that they make the glass in, and it's everywhere. Glass figurines, jewelry, cufflinks, dishes, you name it. It's all very beautiful and very expensive! I found a really pretty necklace with a clear glass heart charm that was only 11 euro, so I could bring a little piece of Venice home with me.
We spent the rest of the day walking around, following our tour guide who was a little old man that, when I asked him where he was from, responded that he had lived in Germany, France, Italy, Prague, Ecuador, Mexico, South Africa, USA, and probably a few other places. He called himself a 'man of the world'. No kidding! He was very knowledgeable about Venice and took us to all the important places and explained their significance in intricate detail. Very interesting. After the tour we had an hour and a half of free time so Shannon and I roamed around the open air markets and stopped at a cafe for Tiramisu, which was created in Venice! It was oh so good. We also got little bottles of Bellini, a peach champagne like cocktail that was also started in Venice and has something to do with Ernest Hemingway, but I forgot what the connection is. Either way, the bellini was really sweet and really good!
We got back on the bus by 7:00 and got home by 10:40 pm because we made a stop for dinner. Shannon had some homework to do, but I didn't have anything demanding homework-wise this weekend so I met my friends at a bar and we went to a club called Space and danced all night! Which brings me to today, having a lazy sunday and being exhausted from the weekend.
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