After the 13 hour night train ride from Vienna to Venice ( with the unhappy German infant, her mom and grandmom) Troy and I learned to never, EVER, take night trains :-) Let our lesson be lessons to you all!

Needless to say, we did arrive in the incredible Venice with enough raw excitement ( that was the only thing keeping us going after a completely sleepless night) to explore the city in great depths yesterday.

Stepping out of Santa Lucia station in the crystal-clear, warm morning is the best feeling both of us have had so far on this trip. All of the buildings were still bathed in that famous golden-glow Venice has at dawn and dusk. Tens of gondolas and canoes were being paddled through the grand canal past our "bus", which is really just another big boat. The air was crisp, but warm enough for my tank top. It was really, really, really nice!

Chugging through the waters to our first stop ( which I don't recall the name) was the best decision we made. It was actually a mistake, as we took the ferry the wrong direction and missed the Zacarias stop, which is the famous San Marco plaza. We ended up on the north outside shore of Venice, and strolled through the somewhat local neighborhood ( local means only half tourists instead of 100% ;-) ) lazing around with our sodas and taking random pictures of hanging laundry, lethargic dogs, and of course the famous canal bridges.

We walked through San Marco square, and Troy was amazed at the amount of pigeons everywhere. We both knew this area was famous for the pigeons, but what they don't tell you is there is an absolute swarm of them in every part of the sqaure. We used our vanilla Leibniz cookies ( hey those are MINE!! :-)) to break into crumbs and feed them...Troy had 4 on his arms at one point...

The streets here are so tiny, if you eat too much, you might not be able to go everywhere. Troy and I had a wonderful time getting completely lost in these little nooks and crannies. We found a little cafe charging an "affordable" 3 euro for a coffe and 4 euro for a local beer....No I am not kidding! Venice prices seem to top even London's, which is really ridiculous. But, I am not fretting, as we are only here for a few days, and we are watching our dollars in the faithful orange budget book Troy has diligently compiled. We have been grocery shopping for our breakfast, lunch and dinner, and once per place, we eat out a local meal.

We enjoyed our drinks in the sun, with delicious mini ciabbatta bread sandwiches with olives, peppers, sundried -tomatoes, basil, brie, procuitto ( sp?), WOW the food is really good....

Then we made our way back to the train station to Padova. Padova, you say? Yes, Padova...Our first host, the chef from Jesolo, never wrote us back :-( So we were lucky to meet Tiziano, a lovely local who gladly took us in.

After arriving in Padova a 30 minute train ride west, we went to have apertif's and then pizza with Tiziano and two of his high school buddies, now classmates in college. We were amazed at the amount of college students out and about all drinking their camparis, or apperol ( I know I'm spelling that wrong) before going to eat pasta. Funny, because when I was in college, I was chugging bud light and eating Taco Bell at 2am :-O

We had a great time with them talking about couchsurfing, our travels so far, and advice for sightseeing here.

Today, it's another perfect day...I think I will wear SHORTS!! The first time on this trip--

Talk to you guys again soon,

xoxoxox