Pizza - Photo Montage

Basically Wifey's eaten the same thing for 3 weeks straight.  

Gelato - Photo Montage

We at alot of Gelato in Italy.  Wifey is sad we're back in the states now.  Must find Gelato domestically!  Wifey's favorite was a dark chocolate and Berries of the Forest from Ci Gusta!  

AirBNB - Venice

Venice is Expensive.  By far the most expensive place we stayed on this trip.  We stayed for 2 nights at this AirBNB.  We paid $144 per night to stay there.  The home did not include a kitchen or living space.  For comparison, our AirBNB outside of Naples cost us $30 for the night with both of those.  We can almost always find an AirBNB under $75 for the night if not closer to $60.  If we had it to do over, Wifey would book the same place in a heartbeat.  The addition of a mini-fridge would be very valuable; but aside from that, we had our needs met and the location was fantastic.  

In researching traveling to Venice, the Internets suggested staying on the island for at least a night if at all possible.  We second this.  Some of our best times in Venice were early mornings watching the locals take their kids to school or late night meandering.  Venice is a tourist overrun nightmare.  If you prefer traveling with any semblance of local culture, you need to say on Venice long enough so the hoards of day-trippers leave and the locals are only slightly outnumbered.  

Like good light-packers; we were grateful for windows that opened so we could hang-dry our clothes over night.   You can just see the bottom half of Wifey's pants hanging in both of the following shots as we lean out our bedroom window overlooking the alley below. 

In the picture including hubby, the bright light at the end of the alley is our neighboring courtyard.  It is surrounded by cafes and features a large Catholic church.  We were *maybe* a 10 minute walk from the nearest water bus stop once you learn the path. A great, and almost-local location for our homebase.  

Our AirBNB host was patient as we arrived later than planned (wrong train exit, then missed water bus) and answered all of our questions easily and quickly.  In addition, the last day we were in Venice, we were able to leave our luggage and backpacks in a locked entryway that our and 2 other 'homes' share. This allowed us to vacate the home timely as well as enjoy our day in Venice before flying back to Germany without the literally weight of our things. 

Prosciutto

Wifey likes prosciutto.  This is new news.  The first time she tried it was part of a sampler plate.  It was amazing.  Note: it still is amazing, but is so expensive here in the states!!!

In Venice, the closest equivalent of fast food we found were these shops where you could buy sandwiches for 5€.  Hubby was not interested, but eventually we agreed to eat a particular meal from separate places and wifey had herself a Prosciutto sandwich!  So yummy! 

The next events are not photo documented for reasons which may soon become clear.  We left the sandwich shop and began walking across St. Peters Square.  Wifey was eating her sandwich and enjoying every moment.  The bread was yummy.  The meat yummy.  Life was good.  

after the tears pic of Prosciutto Ground Zero

Then

Birds.

As best we can put back together, a large seagull swooped from behind Wifey and grabbed the sandwich from her hands and knocking the reminder onto the ground.  Wifey probably froze.  Cause that's what she does under stress.  Hubby became a hint angry at the bird.  And then a swarm of other seagulls descended and tore apart the remaining food.  

As you can imagine this was quite the sight to behold in a square filled with tourists. Which means that a ton of people were now staring at us.  We hurried to the edge of the square to regroup.  In all, the day never really recovered.  We bought new food and went back 'home' until the hoards of folks had returned to the mainland.  

Prosciutto and Melon

For dinner, we chose a sit-down cafe close to our AirBNB and enjoyed the ourdoor seating (with heaters) and calm.  We ordered a delightful appetizer of Prosciutto and Melon.  It's apparently a thing.  And for good reason.  It was amazing!

Florence -> Venice; A Comedy of Errors

Our trip to Pisa was still based out of Florence.  We drove back to town and began preparations for the next day's transfer to Venice.  Goal #1 - Buy Water.   On the train ride from dropping off our rental car (airport) to our Hotel; we saw a Grocery Store out the window and quickly got off the train to see if we could stock up on H20.

We walked up and down every single aisle in the store looking for bottled water. Multiple times.  We found "baby water" in the baby department.  and a few expensive bottles of carbonated water (ewww).  Probably an hour later we found a weird little room off the back corner of the store ... full of bottled water. 

The next question became which brand/bottle do we buy.  No worries ... just make sure it's still water and then pick the best deal!  Except there were no prices.  We double-triple checked ... no prices!  We eventually made a wild guess; and started back out of the strange little room towards check-out when we noticed what looked like a stock ticker in the wall.  It was the water prices by brand and bottle size.  Is there that much volatility in the price of water that they can't just post the prices?  We still do not know.  

The next morning we woke up very very early; missed breakfast at our hotel :(  and caught the first of two trains that would take us to Venice. 

In researching for this trip, Wifey had learned it is important to always book a train with reserved seats unless you're REALLY trying to travel cheap.  So she did.  We boarded our train around 6:00 AM, went to our seats easy-peasy, and chilled for about a half hour until we reached our transfer station.  3 minutes late.  Our transfer time was scheduled for 10 minutes and now it was down to 7.  Wifey was FREAKING out.  Hubby did not feel her since of urgency. Perhaps due to lack of thorough communication.  

Remember, we are traveling 'relatively' light this trip. We each have a backpack and a carry-on size rolling suitcase.  Depending on the day, Wifey may have a small purse or fancy-pack in addition.  After exiting the train, Wifey took the lead, power walking. Upon reaching the first escalator, she picked up her suitcase and started walking up the stairs. Ain't nobody got time for riding the escalator at its speed.  Later discussions revealed that this annoyed Hubby who wasn't prepared for carrying his suitcase at time.  Several escalators of power-walking and eventually jogging later we slipped onto uor next train AS THE DOORS CLOSED.  Had we not carried our bags etc; we wouldn't have made it.  We were not alone.  Hubby decided in retrospect he was glad we had hurried.  

We pulled out our ticket print offs and looked for our seat assignments. There were none to be found.  It turns out, for this, our 4th train in Italy; and our 6th cross country transport; Wifey had failed.  We were on the train, but all the seats were full!?  We just KNEW there were open seats; we just had to find them.  Cue 20 minutes later - nope.  We were on a cross country train with no seats.  So we stood around in one of the joints between cars flabbergasted.  At the next stop (or maybe 2 later?) two folks vacated there seats and a kind lady pointed us towards them.  We hurried; secured the seats and then tackled the next problem .... luggage.  This lovely train had no luggage storage!  

We ended up sliding our suitcases into our foot-space.  Wifey curled on top of hers and hubby straddled his.  One backpack made it under the seat in front of us and the other on Hubby's lap.  It was a rough couple hours, but at least one of us managed to sleep some.  

We learned that this is somewhat normal for the economy trains.  There are more tickets than seats and people just chill in the open spaces.  

While on of us slept, the other watched for our stop; and awakened the sleeping party just in time to exit.  At long last we'd reached Venice!  Exiting the train at Venice we followed instructions to catch a Water Bus and reach our AirBNB.  Except everything looked wrong.  A quick GPS check revealed we had exited on the mainland Venice stop instead of continuing to the island.  See the blue dot on the left of this screenshot?  That was us.  She the aqua "you are here marker"?  That's our AirBNB.  

We backtracked to the ticket office at the mainland train station and explained our situation.  I don't think we're the first ignorant American travelers they've met.  They told us a train platform and time and we hurried off to catch another train across the water.  

Once we exited at the correct Venice stop life continued to be challenging.  We needed to exit the train and get a water bus to the neighborhood of our AirBNB.  We needed a particular bus number.  We followed signs. We got in line.  We got out of line.  We missed our bus (it was full). We almost got on a wrong bus.  We were pushed a bit.  Eventually we boarded the correct water bus and began tackling the next objective ... exiting the bus at the correct stop! 

Pisa

A few quick general Italy notes - Everything is Expensive.  And everything is crowded.  And everything is ticketed.  You can see the tower of Pisa for free.  I mean, its a building.  But if you want to go inside ... there's a fee.  And even more complicated; you have to buy a timed ticket and then show up at that time for entrance.  This is a slightly big deal when you are day-tripping into Pisa for the climb; and parking is a mess.  

We are not afraid of a little walking.  Or climbing.  We parked quite a way from the Tower (for Free!) and power-walked to make our entrance time.  Upon queuing for entrance, one of the staff noticed Wife's wristlet (not-allowed) and redirected us to bag storage.  Blessing of Blessings, Bag storage was efficient and free and we were back entering the Tower in a jiffy.  

We are not afraid of a little walking.  Or climbing.  We parked quite a way from the Tower (for Free!) and power-walked to make our entrance time.  Upon queuing for entrance, one of the staff noticed Wife's wristlet (not-allowed) and redirected us to bag storage.  Blessing of Blessings, Bag storage was efficient and free and we were back entering the Tower in a jiffy.  

Walking the tower is quite an experience.  Did we mention it leans.  It may seem like an insignificant angle, but when climbing; it is tough! 

Once you reached the top there were impressive views of the City of Pisa.  We're a bit spoiled and no-longer care much about impressive views of European cities.  

I'm not 100% sure what was going on when Hubby shot this pic of Wifey, but it's not half bad :) 

While visiting Pisa, we tried to take iconic pictures of ourselves either pushing over the leaning tower or holding it up.  Wifey proved unskilled at lining up the perspective of Hubby. Hubby successfully lined up Wifey and the tower as desired, however #RealLife Wifey vetoed all of his pics because she looked .... plump in them.  

Using the Good Old #SelfieStick; we took this shot - TBH, Wifey hates it.  But ya know what, We Went to Pisa. We Climbed the Tower.  And this is our picture from that day.  

After visiting the tower we returned to our car and struck out for dinner. Our friends Joseph and Mary (I know right) had visited the area previous and recommended Ristorante Il Toscano. Wifey is the travel planner in our family and it seems fails at thorough communication at times.  We were literally sitting at our table here, having already ordered a particular dish which Mary recommended before Hubby realized this was THE restaurant where he was supposed to order that particular meal (Pear Pasta I think).  

Wifey is not off caffeine these days. 

ETA - I admit that we're pretty behind on blogging so this is getting posted about 2.5 months late.  That said, Wifey seriously misses Italian Cappuccinos now that we're back in the USA.

Wifey's Steak:

Hubby's Pear Pasta - Thanks Again Mary!