Saturday morning, we woke up around 9.30am so we could get ready and be out before the 11.00am lock out. We tried (unsuccessfully) to find the café from the day before, settled on a place for lunch (pizza again, obviously), then started the long trek over to Piazza San Marco.
Once we were at the piazza, we went into Saint Mark’s Basilica. The place was truly beautiful. I took some pictures of it, but pictures can’t even come close to doing the place justice. After the basilica, we went to the Doge’s Palace right next door. The doge (duke) was the head of Venice government, before being demoted to a figurehead, but either way, had an incredible palace. The place was huge. There were living rooms, map rooms, art rooms, senate rooms, prisons, and an armory. The coolest part, though, was seeing Tintoretto’s “Il Paradiso.”
We then walked around for a while, went back to the hostel, hung out with the hostel guys (Dan, an Italian-Australian, chatted with us for a long time), and then got ready for the evening. We had decided to save some money and eat for 5 Euros at the hostel. We met a bunch of other fellow travelers over some pesto pasta, bruschetta, and some questionable chocolate cake. After that, the five of us went out for a very calm night out. We went to an Irish pub for a while, then back to the students’ area. But Italy is more like the US in terms of its schedule. We got to the bars around 1.30am, so things were clearing out. We sat down on a bench and just watched the craziness around us. We saw some bizarre things that night.
In the morning, we had to check out by 10am, but daylight savings had kicked in, giving us one extra hour of sleep. Once out of the hostel, we headed over to the coast to catch the vaporetto (like a ferry) to another island, Murano. Murano is known for its glass-blowing. We were able to see a guy blowing glass for a few minutes, and then walked around the island, going in and out of glass shops. It was all very pretty. We got lunch, and then went back to the main land with the intention of getting a gondola ride.
Earlier that day, we had to get from one side of a canal to another and there were no bridges close by. Venice has set up a public transportation of sorts with gondolas. For .50 Euro cents you can get a gondola ride for about 2 minutes across the canal. We had already done this, so when we found out that for a half-hour private gondola ride we would each have to pay 20 Euros plus tip, we decided that the gondola ride earlier that day counted and that we didn’t want to pay the money. Instead, we went shopping for masks and other souvenirs. For dinner that night, half of the group went to get Indian food, while myself and another girl were more in the mood for more Italian food, so we got, what else, more pizza.
Having already checked out of the hostel and not wanting to pay money for a third night, decided to spend the night in the Venice airport instead. We got our bags, hopped on the last airport shuttle of the night (after missing the one before that one), and got to the airport. When we walked up to the airport doors, they were locked. We went to every door in front of the airport and they were all locked. It was 1.00am, freezing outside, the bus had left, and we were stuck outside! We could see a couple of people inside, sleeping (I guess they had gotten there before the doors were locked) and tried getting their attention to see if they could help us. Some of the girls even suggested spending the night in the elevator for warmth (not happening). The people inside couldn’t help us, but I eventually flagged down a maintenance man/janitor on the inside and after running around a bit, he pried a door open for us, setting off an alarm in the whole airport…but we didn’t care…we had made it inside! We found a section of the airport to try to sleep in (try being the key word). It was freezing, so I layered up. I was wearing two pairs of socks, boots, leggings, jeans, two shirts, two sweaters, and gloves. On top of all of that, we had found some cardboard boxes and (must to the disgust of one girl in our group), used them to lie on. We even got a thumbs-up from a homeless man in the airport. New low in life? Maybe. Do I regret it? Nope.
Around 8.00am, the café opened and we got some coffee and breakfast for fuel. We got on our RyanAir flight around 10.00am, happy to be going back home. When we landed in Sevilla, the original plan had been to spend the night there and go home on Tuesday. But, myself and another girl, Mary-Ryan, were so exhausted and couldn’t deal with another night in a hostel and decided to leave that day. After a ton of confusion and stress about what bus or train I would take home, I finally found a way.
When I got home, I couldn’t have been happier. The trip to Venice had been amazing, but I just wanted a hot (clean) shower and to sleep in my own bed. Whenever I leave Navalmoral, I always realize just how much I’m growing to like it.
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