Weekend Trip 2

Can I study aboard in Venice instead of Rome? Not that Rome’s not amazing or anything, but…can I? Please?

Our second major weekend trip through Italy took us on a four-hour train ride to the water-locked city of Venice.  The train ride was smooth and beautiful as always. I do wish that the United States would utilize train travel more often from city to city. There’s so much less hassle and much more freedom to traveling by train rather than by car or plane.

We arrived at the train station and quickly found our hotel, which was right on the edge of a canal feeding into the Grand Canal. I shared a room with two of my current roommates, and we were all pleasantly surprised by its comfortable size. After grabbing sandwiches for lunch (and eating them while dangling our feet off the edge of the Grand Canal…you know…no big…), we took the main ferry system along the Canal. As was true with all of my classmates, I couldn’t believe how clean the buildings and the water were. There was no graffiti, no traffic congestion, and no beggars; I suppose those are the perks of having to use a boat rather than a car.

And none of us could take enough pictures. I knew that Venice was the city of canals. That’s a well-enough known fact. I don’t think I ever fully realized that it was practically two manmade islands pieced together like a puzzle. The architecture had a refreshingly-Spanish feel to it. It was so very *not* Roman that you couldn’t take your eyes away from the seemingly-floating structures.

The trip was a solid 30 minutes (no one really noticed, to be honest) to Piazza San Marco, one of the few large walkable spaces in Venice. 

While the piazza was bigger than I had ever imagined and was wonderfully utilized by the people, construction in every corner divided up the space into odd proportions and found its way into most of my pictures. Regardless, the piazza became a major staple in my trip because we ended up going there the following two days.

We also found that, over the course of a three day weekend, we can spend tons of money on souvenirs. It probably doesn’t help any when it feels like we are only spending monopoly money because the Euro doesn’t look like a real form of currency.

Anyway, the cart vendors and shop owners around San Marco got their pay day. Congratulations to them.

My best purchase, in my opinion, was my carnival mask. This weekend was the opening of the Carnevale di Venezia, a celebration that is much like Mardi Gras in the United States. Every vender was selling variations of traditional Masquerade masks throughout the city as well as capes of fabric to wear over your clothing. People also arrived at the piazza in their own costumes. We saw a group of colorfully-decorated mushroom people having lunch by the canal, many little girls dressed up like Disney princesses, and even a gathering of Teletubbies (although that one was probably a little more scarring than the rest).  

The other portion of our trip took place in Verona, a small city about an hour outside of Venice. It is best known as the setting of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. And yes, I was indeed a girly girl and wanted to (and got to) see “Juliet’s” balcony, no matter how fake it is.

I could live in this city. While there wasn’t too terribly much to see (architecture-wise), it was a sweetly romantic town with a bustling atmosphere, good shopping, a landscape of hills and water, and the ever-illustrious Alps setting the backdrop.

I am quickly finding that the charm of Italy lies in its smaller towns where only the character of the people and the atmosphere of their lives support it.