Hello friends! So this past weekend I traveled to Venice, Italy to meet up with two Pi Phis, girls from my sorority, and several of their friends! The weekend started out with Tym coming down on a bus to be to my apartment around 8:30 AM on Friday. I set my alarm for 6:50 AM and woke up to several missed calls from Tym who had gotten in around 6:15 that morning and had been waiting outside my apartment for me to come down and let him inside! Definitely was a great surprise!
From there, I went to class with Tym promising to have lunch ready for me at noon. Went to class, noon rolls around and Tymothy is unconscious asleep in my bed, so I had to make lunch.... :) Went back to class, and then came back early to pack and shower and get ready for our trip! Our plan was to take the metro to get to the bus station because the only way to get out to the Beauvais airport is by bus. I had it all planned out to leave by 3:50, giving us plenty of time on the metro and to walk to the bus station for our bus at 4:35. Well, knowing that I run on "Caine Time" we were just about out the door right after 3:50 but I stopped in the kitchen and ended up knocking my eggs off the shelf and onto the floor. After cleaning those up we hurried to the metro and were on a train around 4:05. We had to switch trains and we knew we were cutting it extremely close! Ended up getting off the metro at 4:31 and had to run through the metro and down a couple streets until we finally got to the bus station at 4:36! I found our driver and asked if he would wait for us to buy our tickets and he did not seem all that concerned and went back to talking with another bus driver. We bought our tickets and ran to the bus only to find everyone else boarding. We were sweaty, out of breath at laughing so hard and that absolute ridiculousness of the situation! Thank goodness we didn't miss that bus!
After our bus ride we made is to Beauvais Airport for our Ryanair budget airline flight. Neither of us really had any expectations but budget airlines are rather different than commercial airlines. With budget airlines, you're given a number, not a seat placement. So when the time comes to check in everyone stands in a long line and tries to shove their way to the front so they can walk out to the plane first for the best seat pick. Turns out you pick your seat and hold on to your stuff during the flight and of course they don't serve you snacks :( The ride was very bumpy but we got to Venice just fine!
We took a bus to a train station where we met up with the Pi Phis and their friends. We had one of those crazy, screaming, awkward run across the train station moments but we were all so excited to see each other that none of us really cared! After lots of hugging they walked us back to our apartment for the weekend. Tym and I realized that it was a bad idea to bring a suitcase with wheels because every 30 yards, or meters for you Europeans out there, we had to cross the bridges over the canals. It was FREEZING outside but our apartment was toasty warm when we finally got there!
Our apartment was beautiful! We had two bathrooms and three bedrooms for the 7 of us and a nice kitchen to share! Tym had to go to the bathroom really bad and ran in to one to go and ran out yelling "which one do I use?" Turns out, there was a toilet and a bidet. A bidet is used for "intimate washing" as my french teacher explained to me when I got back. So instead of toilet paper, you squat over this toilet looking sink? and it washes your bottom for you. Weird, I know.
Toilet on left, bidet on right.
Tym and I were starving so they took us out for an Italian dinner. The means, pizza or pasta? We went to a nice little restaurant and all ordered pizzas and caught up on each other's study abroad experiences, roommates, funny stories and news from home!
The next morning we headed out to San Marco Plaza to see a parade of masks and costumes. Grabbing breakfast on the way, we took many little bridges and back alleyways to get to the plaza. The San Marco Plaza was beautiful but it was hard to take a lot of pictures because it was sooooo cold! We were bundled up head to toe but the wind was horrible! We kept looking for the parade and it ended up starting late because it was not much of a parade but more of a large group of drunk people wearing costumes of animals and other ridiculous things dancing to a marching band. We were extremely disappointed because we thought it was a parade of masks and costumes....failed attempt. So we window shopped and wandered around the see what was near the plaza.
On our way to San Marco Plaza.
A view of San Marco plaza with the Carnevale stage in the background.
Basilica in the plaza.
A gondola on the river!
Pi Phis in the plaza!
Carnevale stage!
While walking around we found the wine fountain. Apparently, this fountain uses wine instead of water but it was too cold for them to turn it on. Again, another disappointment because we wanted to see the wine fountain but instead we all bought hot wine to warm up! The fountain was stained red from wine running through it though! It is hard to see in the pictures but it definitely was red!
From the wine fountain we could see the water's edge with boats lined up along the side. It was so much colder over by the water but we knew we needed to get a couple pictures before heading back in towards the plaza. I sent someone a postcard, Grandma and Grandpa did you get this one?, it has this identical background? Not sure who I sent it to but someone got it!
Oompa!
Freezing!!
Here are some of the crazy costumes that we saw! We were hoping to see more people in costumes but we all got the feeling that the locals do not celebrate Carnevale as much as the tourists do. A handful of people were dressed up and we got some pictures!
We spent all of saturday touring around and looking for masks! Every other store along the side of the street was a mask shop! All of the other shops were pizza/pasta restaurants! I have no idea how these people make enough money selling masks to survive, especially when half of the city is in the same boat! The masks we saw were incredible! Every color and style you could think of. Some had feathers or glitter and others had sequins and ribbons. Some were big enough to cover a person's entire face, neck and head and others only covered right around the eyes. I could have spent forever looking at the masks but after 15 plus stores we all were tired of seeing relatively the same thing and the shop keepers being extremely pushy! I ended up buying just a simple blue one that is on its way home to Cali. She doesn't know its in the mail for her yet so I will be excited to hear when she gets it!
While looking for masks we made our way to the Rialto Bridge. I was surprised that there were not more monuments or famous things to see in Venice besides this bridge, the San Marco Plaza and the gondolas and canals. Regardless, this bridge was beautiful and we were able to see all kinds of gondolas as well as a great view from the top!
Abby and I!
After mask shopping literally all day it was time to find some more pizza and pasta for supper! For lunch we had calzones and for supper I had spaghetti, because I was going through withdraws, Tym had an omelette and everyone else either had spaghetti or pizza! Cannot say how good it was to have spaghetti again!
Calzones for lunch!
Kirsten's Pizza!
Everyone waiting for our food! We were trying to warm up!
Omelette for supper!
SPAGHETTI!
Gelato for dessert! Sooo delicious!
After supper, we trucked it back to San Marco Plaza to see if anything was going on. Nothing was going on. We took some pictures, walked a lap around the square, froze our butts off and walked quickly back to the apartment. It was so unbelievably cold that it was hard to enjoy ourselves outside all weekend. Sunday it was at least warmer than saturday but we woke up to several inches of snow on sunday morning!
San Marco Plaza at night.
The next morning our friends left early to catch their train to Rome. I got to sleep in, loved that, and then Tym and I packed up our stuff and made plans for what we wanted to see for the few hours we had on sunday. We carried our bags through the snow and made it to the shoreline to watch boats go in and out and to see people running along the water's edge. It was warmer than the day before but there were 2 or 3 inches of snow on the ground and it made it difficult to roll my suitcase and walk up and down steps. The shoreline was beautiful and we spent almost an hour walking up and down it to look at the shops and boats.
A delicious looking meringue dessert!
Of course it was required that we got gelato!
A beautiful view on our walk down to the shoreline.
All in all, it was a great weekend spent with friends in a beautiful city! The weather was freezing and there were way too many drunk tourists to count but we all had a great time! I can officially say I've been to Venice, Italy and one day will go back for a gondola ride. There were roughly 90 euros a person...so we will wait until I am not on a strict traveling budget to take a gondola ride. For now, they were just beautiful to look at. I am sorry it has taken me so long to put up this blog post! In my next one, you will understand why I have not had time to work on this. Sorry for the delayed update, miss you all!!
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