The one thing I remember about Venice this time around is this:
Without a GPS, a compass, or even the sun, I venture outside of the apartment near Rialto Bridge on a Sunday morning. Let's try a little exercise in futility here. From the house door I start slowly and head one block toward this piazza I remember as San Benedetto. Having been to a school run by Benedictine monks, I can remember that, it stands to reason. So far, so good. From there, I scramble over a little bridge that is being used by amateur musicians, who take their sweet time in setting up their instruments. From the quizzical expressions on their faces, I'd say they are about as lost as I am.
Now, let's retrace those steps, I am thinking with a grim laugh. Over the bridge, around the corner, to San Benedetto. Wait a minute, that doesn't check out, as there is a supermarket (actually open on a Sunday in Über-Catholic Italy!) now standing where the church is supposed to be. So it's back to the bridge and to one of the other three directions. Number one leads to a more minor canal. Number two zig zags through a narrow alleyway until I am heading toward San Marco. Number three takes me back to San Benedetto, where I now have my standard four (actually seven) choices over where to go from there. I laugh all the way back to the front door while the Venetians carry on with their Sunday routines. And so we're back in the world's largest labyrinth.
But back to the beginning: for our trip, we decide to wing it overnight with Hambone, the name we chose for our white car when we purchased it months ago. Until the Austrian borders, everything is fairly routine. In Austria, then, Liebi is introduced to something that induces a head shaking incomprehension she has not known since learning Nepali years ago: toll roads. That's right, the privilege of paying for the use of roads that have already been built. Liebi quickly gets over this, however, and instead decides to focus on the sheer panoramic beauty of the Austrian Alps, although I need to remind her every now and then to keep her eye on the road and her hand on the wheel.
Before the gondolas and San Marco, we still have to navigate our way through Northern Italy, its ever increasing network of roads, and yet more toll roads. Funny, how the traveler will appreciate Germany once every other European country has relieved you of dozens of dollars for using their streets.
The heavy pollution is thrown in for free. We seriously begin to second guess our decision to drive down there, as Northern Italy is concealed in a heavy cloak of smog, topped off by hazy Venice itself. The main reason for this, one of the locals tells me, is the pollution from the cruise ships docking in their harbors daily. Years ago, it used to be one cruise a week or thereabouts. Now it's five to six per day. Supply and demand, I guess. A cruise ship is a little town on the water that, it goes without saying, has plenty of its own energy to burn. I don't handle it very well, at first, and neither do the kids, and we cough up half a lung before reaching Venice.
Finally, we park at Tronchetto (twenty bucks a day) near the train station, board a monorail ($1.50 per person) and a water bus ($7.50 per head) before the realtor takes us to our apartment near Rialto Station. Relief, and a few days off for Hambone, our trusted vehicle back at Tronchetto. Ciao, bello! We are in Venezia.
Without a GPS, a compass, or even the sun, I venture outside of the apartment near Rialto Bridge on a Sunday morning. Let's try a little exercise in futility here. From the house door I start slowly and head one block toward this piazza I remember as San Benedetto. Having been to a school run by Benedictine monks, I can remember that, it stands to reason. So far, so good. From there, I scramble over a little bridge that is being used by amateur musicians, who take their sweet time in setting up their instruments. From the quizzical expressions on their faces, I'd say they are about as lost as I am.
Now, let's retrace those steps, I am thinking with a grim laugh. Over the bridge, around the corner, to San Benedetto. Wait a minute, that doesn't check out, as there is a supermarket (actually open on a Sunday in Über-Catholic Italy!) now standing where the church is supposed to be. So it's back to the bridge and to one of the other three directions. Number one leads to a more minor canal. Number two zig zags through a narrow alleyway until I am heading toward San Marco. Number three takes me back to San Benedetto, where I now have my standard four (actually seven) choices over where to go from there. I laugh all the way back to the front door while the Venetians carry on with their Sunday routines. And so we're back in the world's largest labyrinth.
But back to the beginning: for our trip, we decide to wing it overnight with Hambone, the name we chose for our white car when we purchased it months ago. Until the Austrian borders, everything is fairly routine. In Austria, then, Liebi is introduced to something that induces a head shaking incomprehension she has not known since learning Nepali years ago: toll roads. That's right, the privilege of paying for the use of roads that have already been built. Liebi quickly gets over this, however, and instead decides to focus on the sheer panoramic beauty of the Austrian Alps, although I need to remind her every now and then to keep her eye on the road and her hand on the wheel.
Before the gondolas and San Marco, we still have to navigate our way through Northern Italy, its ever increasing network of roads, and yet more toll roads. Funny, how the traveler will appreciate Germany once every other European country has relieved you of dozens of dollars for using their streets.
The heavy pollution is thrown in for free. We seriously begin to second guess our decision to drive down there, as Northern Italy is concealed in a heavy cloak of smog, topped off by hazy Venice itself. The main reason for this, one of the locals tells me, is the pollution from the cruise ships docking in their harbors daily. Years ago, it used to be one cruise a week or thereabouts. Now it's five to six per day. Supply and demand, I guess. A cruise ship is a little town on the water that, it goes without saying, has plenty of its own energy to burn. I don't handle it very well, at first, and neither do the kids, and we cough up half a lung before reaching Venice.
Finally, we park at Tronchetto (twenty bucks a day) near the train station, board a monorail ($1.50 per person) and a water bus ($7.50 per head) before the realtor takes us to our apartment near Rialto Station. Relief, and a few days off for Hambone, our trusted vehicle back at Tronchetto. Ciao, bello! We are in Venezia.
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