Venice: Day 6

Ah, Venice!

Early Saturday morning, Trevor and I said goodbye to the Lukes and caught a train to Venice. Since we were so close, we wanted to go see it for ourselves!

And... I have mixed feelings about it. I expected it to be completely magical, but to me it felt like more of a tourist trap (more on that later). Still, I'm glad we went to see it. Most people I know who have visited loved it... Don't let me scare you away!

It is very pretty there.

I was tempted by the Venetian masks! It's almost Halloween after all.

We didn't take a Gondola ride--it turns out those are fairly pricey. Instead we opted for riding the water bus around the island. We were lucky and managed to get close to the railing, so we had some pretty great views! That's all we needed.





I know for some the Gondola ride is the most magical part of their trip. Maybe it is romantic gliding through some of the smoother canals. Our main exposure to them though was on the Grand Canal, which was a bit choppy. Just watching the people bounce around in the gondolas made me feel seasick--that part of the experience I wouldn't wish for! And to me, the gondolas just looked like gussied up canoes--that's when I realized I wasn't feeling the magic of Venice. 😅

The food in Venice was good though! We found a little restaurant where we could get a plate of Venetian finger foods. We didn't know exactly what all of it was, besides some calamari, but it tasted great!

We made sure to check out some of the most famous sites in Venice, like the Doge's Palace.

It was incredibly opulent--the pictures don't do it justice!

Then we ventured to St. Mark's Basilica.

It was gorgeous inside, although having seen St. Peter's Basilica, we weren't as amazed as we would have been beforehand.

Sometime in between the Doge's Palace and St. Peter's Basilica, this happened:

This is my Travelon anti-theft purse that I first bought for my trip to Europe with Hayley. It's lined with iron mesh so no one can cut through it and steal it. All of a sudden I noticed that both straps were coming off the purse, exposing the metal mesh. I don't think that was a coincidence or an accident... I think someone tried to slice it off me. And I didn't even feel anything! That's the creepiest part.

I think that's part of why Venice came off as a tourist trap to me--I didn't feel entirely safe there. The street vendors were the most aggressive in Venice as opposed to anywhere else we went! Before we went to Rome, my sister-in-law Amber warned us about flower vendors. They pretend they are giving you a flower for free, or they'll drop it to try to get you to pick it up, and then they charge you for it. We didn't encounter any in Rome, but SO MANY in Venice. They would come right up to me offering a rose with a big smile, and when I said no, they would still try to put it in my pockets. I had to jump back so they couldn't reach and yell "No!" again. Ugh.

Oh well. I'm still grateful I can say that I've seen Venice, but I don't feel a huge drive to go back again.

That night we got on a plane and headed for Paris.