Interestingly, (at least to me!) there are a lot of similarities between Michigan and Italy. Both are well known for their agricultural crops, are recognizable shapes, are peninsulas, and they share a similar latitude on the globe. I wonder if they talk about 'Up North' like we do? Anyway, that's where we went next, up the boot! We left Florence, went west to Pisa, then headed back east to Venice stopping at a winery for lunch along the way.
Pisa! The tower is a prayer tower, there's a Baptistery and a Cathedral there also, and that's about it, except a bazillion tourists! We had an hour there, but only needed 45 minutes.
I like this photo because you can really see the tower is angled compared to the other buildings.
See all the people with their
hands in the air? They're getting the classic '
pushing the tower over' or '
holding it up' pictures. And they were everywhere! it was pretty comical to watch :)
Yep, it's still
leaning and so are we!
Ahhh I'm
shoving it over! Peter's being behaved.
We did get
McDonald's in Pisa. I've never been to McDonald's internationally, and yep, the
fries are the same! yum!
Lunch was at a
picturesque winery. I say winery, but it really was more of an Italian Farm. Grapes, olives, herbs, etc. We were given a tour and then a full course
lunch. Note to future travelers: Our host told us it was a wet summer and poor harvest this year and the wine wont be great next year!
Grapes on the left, olives on the right, beauty all around.
After a long
cross country haul, we made it to Venice at about 8:30 pm. We checked in to a very lovely hotel and then headed out for a quick bite along the canal.
In the morning we were up and at 'em starting with a tour of a Venetian
glass factory. This was actually a factory tour, we watched him form a beautiful
vase and horse figurine. They explained to us how they color the glass and some of the other techniques.
After a short boat ride, we were dropped off near the city center, just in time for a tour of their
palace and then
Cathedral.
A
prince in his palace
Venetian =
gold leafed or it should! Their palace was interesting because it's 'newer', and has features in it for weather and earthquakes that we hadnt come across yet. Art was done on canvases and there were fireplaces throughout because of the damp, cooler climate in Venice.
This was on the
Bridge of 'Sighs'. It's the bridge connecting the palace and the prison, so prisoners would sigh at the last sight of the city and then at the first upon their release.
When we left the palace and walked to the Cathedral, it was nearly
high tide, meaning water was bubbling up through the sidewalks and forming huge puddles in the city center. This is the foyer of the Cathedral, built specifically to manage the water.
Their Cathedral was also unique from what we'd seen. It was all done in gold and
mosaics. Also, St. Mark's bones are supposedly buried here, talk about a
watery grave! ;)
It was a
lovely town, we were thankful to not be dodging cars and Vespas that's for sure! We spent the remainder of the day getting lunch and
winding our way through the streets back to our hotel, it was actually more of a trick than we imagined!
This was as close as we got to a
gondola ride. The weather was giving us trouble, and spoiler alert: it's not really as romantic an experience as you see in the
movies!
We are very thankful we met some
wonderful people on our trip, interesting to talk to and good traveling companions.
That evening was a
farewell dinner with our group at our hotel, it was such a nice time, we talked late into the night and didnt want to part! Here I am with our fearless manager
Letezia. Don'ta Worry!
The next morning it was a
water taxi to the airport, a hop over the Alps to Zurich and then the long haul to O'Hare, before touching down in GR at about 9:30 pm, I think it was about 20 hours in total.
Ciao Italia! You were beautiful!
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