Italy: Day 2

Saturday was our last day in Venice and we wanted to take a gondola ride. You can't go to Venice without doing the main tourist attraction, right?  We went early in the morning and most of the gondolas were still covered up.  We learned quickly that most Italians take a slower start to their mornings. It was a peaceful ride through the back canals.

We then took a water taxi over to the island where the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore is located. This had Tintoretto’s Last Supper painting.

We also took the elevator up the bell tower which had some amazing views of the city.

A view of St. Mark's Square.

After going back over to the main islands we walked over to Doge's Palace. A doge was similar to a governor. Once again the buildings were very ornate.

One of the many painted and sculpted ceilings.

The Chamber of the Great Council - one of the largest rooms in Europe.

Marc being Marc in the prison of the palace.

After a little more getting lost in Venice we grabbed our bags and headed for the train station. We took the fast speed train that got to speeds of 150+mph and headed for Rome. Here are a few pictures taken of the Italian countryside.

Italy: Day 1

So here I am awake at 4:45 in the morning. Jet lag. Marc is already up and gone to work. Jet lag. I have a puppy sleeping in her crate in my room and a child that made her way to the couch in the middle of the night. The computer is far enough away not to disturb anyone, so I thought I'd start blogging about our trip. There will be a lot of pictures and a lot of words, but since I may never go back I want to make sure and document it all.

Several weeks ago the possibility of a business trip to Italy was presented to Marc.  His company's policy would have allowed for me to join him for free (airfare, hotel, and food) if he gave up his first class ticket. So that's what my amazing husband did. He flew out to Turin, Italy to work for a few days and then I flew into Venice to meet him. I tried to sleep on the overnight flight, but unfortunately that didn't happen. So when I arrived at 9:30am Venice time we started exploring the city.

All of the hotels in Rome are little hidden gems. Marc arrived in Venice the day before I did since his meeting ended a day earlier than planned, and he searched out the hotel we had booked. The signs are small on the side of the building, but behind the door to our hotel was this little courtyard. And although the buildings are old, the ones we stayed in were very nicely renovated on the inside.

After dropping of my suitcase we started exploring the city built on the water. There are 409 bridges in Venice and I think we crossed each one twice. ha!

There are no cars on the island and very few bicycles. Everyone walks or takes a boat.

The Rialto Bridge is probably the most famous of the bridges. It crosses the Grand Canal.

One of the things that all of the websites tell you to do in Venice is to just wander and get lost in the streets. I wanted to make sure we did that, and it turns out there was no problem accomplishing that goal.  Every time you go anywhere you get lost - but in a good way.

Our first stop of the morning was to St. Mark's Basilica.

The scenes painted here are from the life of Jesus.

 

 One of my friends I've known for probably 20 years, Laura, is an art teacher at a local high school.  Before we left I asked her if she could point us to any "must see" arts while in Italy. I'm in no way artistic and art appreciation was not my favorite class in college. I do however appreciate art. She was so kind to send us a very detailed list of the important things to see and why they were important. We printed our her list and carried it with us everywhere.  It was such a great help to us and really made the trip even better.  For example I would have looked at this and said, okay, cool bronze statues of some horses.  But she let us know that these probably date back to the ancient Roman time period and very few of their bronze statues have survived.

We visited Galleria dell’Accademia which is a museum with many ornate rooms (like everything else in the country) as well as artwork and artifacts.  Towards the end of this museum the lack of sleep in 26 hours was catching up to me so we headed back to the hotel for a nap. After dinner we wandered around the city some more before calling it a day.

4th of July

We had a great weekend celebrating our country and our freedom.  I've always loved celebrating Independence Day, but I think the years I taught early American history gave me a greater love for our country. The freedoms we have were fought for.  Fought hard. It's so hard to see so many of these freedoms challenged these days. We are living in a different time and I doubt that things will ever get better. But we will celebrate as John Adams said we should:

"It ought to be celebrated by pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other..."

We were able to celebrate with most of our family this year.

It warms my heart to see this girl bringing books along to read.

Some sleepy girls on the ride home. Poor Macy.  Her head fell down even a little further when I opened the door to get her out.

Never Say Never

The girls have been asking for a dog for a really, really long time.  I would have been fine never having a dog. They are a lot of work and I'm the one home all day. But I love my family too much to say no. We now have a new miniature dachshund puppy named Riley.  We surprised the girls when we were able to go a week earlier than expected to pick her up.

The girls knew that they would be the ones that would be taking care of this dog. Feeding, playing, taking it outside, and everything else that comes along with it.  Kayla has held up her end of the bargain so far and has been a huge help.

So here we are in the middle of house training, crate training, and trying to keep her from chewing up the furniture. I'll be glad when these phases are over, but she sure is cute.