Venice for Carnivale!

03/05/11

     Falling asleep before 10 certainly made getting up at 3:45 a bit more bearable, but still, seeing the clock say a time that early is never a pleasant sight. I woke up, hopped in the shower, and quickly packed before heading on our way to walk to the train station down the street at 5. We had to catch the train that took us directly to the airport that we were flying out of. I don’t like walking anywhere, particularly train stations, at this time in the morning, but we were with a group of 8 girls so I felt quite a bit safer knowing we were traveling with big numbers. Normally, I love having short trips, but for some reason, that morning we all kind of wished we had a long train ride ahead of us that we could sleep on. Instead, we had a 45-minute flight and then we were landing! It was as though we took off, had enough time to listen to about four songs, then it was time to turn my iPod back off and land! 

     From the airport, we took a bus to a town called Mestre where we were staying for the night. We were fitting 8 people in a 4 person hotel because it was the only availability we were able to find during the Carnivale festival. There were no openings on the actual island of Venice itself during the weekend that weren’t outrageously expensive so we took the advice of a teacher of ours and stayed in the outskirts in this town and just took a bus or cab to get to Venice. When we arrived at the hotel, we weren’t able to check-in yet so we just left our bags there and headed on our way into the city of Venice for the remainder of the day. After waiting at the bus stop nearby for over an hour watching countless buses pass by without stopping because they were so filled up with people, we asked the man at the counter of the hotel to call us a cab to get to the main island of Venice. This was a great idea because we got there within 10 minutes of asking for the call! We got dropped off at Piazzale Roma, the first part of Venice you walk into. 

     We hopped on a waterbus to take us from there over to San Marco Square, the main focus are of the Carnivale festival. The bus itself took about a half an hour to get from on end to the other of the island, but it was the perfect opportunity to capture pictures of what is my favorite city I have visited yet. Venice is unlike anything I have ever seen before and unlike anything I will probably ever see in the future as well. I felt like I took a picture of every building we passed, but I couldn’t help it because they were all so pretty and the fact that they were all placed right alongside the waterfront made them that much more beautiful. 

One of the many pictures I took on the waterbus

Christina and I enjoying the view

Saint Mary's Basilica along the canals

     As we arrived at the San Marco stop, we saw the crowds in front of us and I could see that we were in for quite an adventure. The first thing we saw after getting off the boat were Carnivale masks everywhere. We all really wanted to buy one, but were starving since we hadn’t yet eaten so first we stopped and grabbed lunch before going back to grab a mask. I had pasta with clams for lunch, the first time I’ve had this yet, but I figured I had to try seafood in a city that’s built upon water. The pasta was great and I’m really happy I got it! From there, the eight of us (my roommates and I, plus two other girls from my program Kim and Marisa) went and picked out masks. All of ours were so different from one another’s, making it fun! The one I picked out was black, gold and white with a large black feather on the side. I really loved how it looked and the color combination and each stand I went to I kept coming back to it so I decided this was the mask for me! 

San Marco Square

Campanile Tower in San Marco Square

San Marco Church

     After purchasing our masks and exploring all of what San Marco Square had to offer, we sat alongside the water on a ledge and hung out while having a couple drinks and waiting to meet up with friends. We did all our sightseeing of the San Marco area that morning and devoted the rest of the day to people watching and meeting up with friends from school and home. We found a group of friends studying in Vienna as well as kids from another program in Rome and relaxed by the water all afternoon. As we sat along the edge, we felt like celebrities because nearly every person who walked by us snapped a photo of us. I can’t say I blame them though because after all, there were eight of us sitting in front of what is one of the most scenic backdrops I’ve ever seen in unique masks. We decided not to move until we counted 100 people who took a picture of us, and we reached this number relatively quickly!   

     After hanging out all afternoon, we wandered around for a place to go to dinner nearby the Rialto Bridge. After dinner, we walked around and some girls did a bit of shopping before heading back in to our hotel for the night. We didn’t want to stay out late as it had already been a long day and we knew we wanted to get an early start to the next afternoon so we could accomplish everything we wanted to that we hadn’t yet done on Saturday. As we walked back towards where we needed to catch the waterbus, we ran into a DJ playing in the center of a Piazza outdoors. The square was packed with people in masks and costumes dancing the night away and since it was still early, we decided to hang out and join the party for a bit. After about a half an hour, we proceeded on our walk back to the bus and hopped on it. We got back to our hotel by about 11 and quickly fell asleep. Because it was eight of us in a four-person room, it was four people to a bed. Let’s just say, I woke up sweating several times because there was no room to move! Either way, I had a very successful first day in Venice and experiencing Carnivale and couldn’t wait for round two the next day! 

03/06/11

     Our room woke up early on Sunday given that we went to bed at such a reasonable hour the night before and we were on our way back to the actual island of Venice by 10:30 that morning. We hopped back on the waterbus to head farther down the island, but this time got off at the Rialto stop by the bridge. Our first plan of attack for the day, something you can’t travel to Venice and not do, was to take a gondola ride. We bargained with the man standing there, got a good rate, then split into two groups of four, and went for a ride. Our drivers agreed to ride next to each other or close to each other so that we could still communicate with each other. As we took off from the dock, I felt as if this moment was surreal. Taking a gondola ride isn’t something I ever thought I would actually do and the fact that I had the opportunity to do so, and in Venice for that matter, made my trip. While the ride itself wasn’t super long, the view was astounding and it didn’t matter to me how long it was. We went down the main stream for a while and then turned into the smaller canal streets between buildings. As we traveled around, we talked a bit to our driver who seemed to know every other driver. He told us how it was a family run business and all the drivers were in some way related to one another, which I thought was a really cool thing. 

     After snapping several photos on my gondola ride, we got off and tried to meet up with one of my roommate Kelly’s friend from home, Sean. He goes to the University of Kansas and is studying about an hour outside of Venice so I got the chance to talk to him more about KU, which was fun to hear about since Sam goes there now. We had seen just about everything that we necessarily wanted to out of the trip so everyone did a little extra shopping and I bought myself a Murano glass ring in the color of my birth stone (emerald), as well as my souvenir from every city I visit (postcard and shot glass). 

     As we walked around shopping, we headed back towards San Marco to stop at the Murano Glass Factory to take a tour. With the crowd, it took us nearly a half an hour to get somewhere that would ordinarily take maybe 10 minutes. Going inside the glass factory was very interesting. We watched a man blow glass while it was hot and within a matter of five minutes, the man had shaped a beautiful glass vase and horse sculpture. It was interesting to see how quickly one can do this once you learn how to do it. From watching this, we went upstairs and got to see several of the glass creations they are famous for. Although none of us could afford anything they offered in our wildest dreams, it was really neat to see. 

     By this time, it was nearing when we needed to head back to ensure we made it to our train in time. We sat along the waterfront for twenty minutes more to soak in the sight one last time and then began our journey to the Mestre train station to head back to Rome after a great two day vacation!