Venice / Anne's Birthday

Eric suggested that we go to Venice the weekend before my birthday to celebrate and I agreed! This was my first trip to Italy--the homeland! We left work early on Friday and headed to Venice. We didn't get there till about 9pm, and then it took like an hour and half to get to the hotel, with a bus/water taxi combo mode of transport--cars are not allowed on the island of Venice. We finally got there, settled in, and headed out to get something to eat. Venice doesn't have much of a night life, or late night restaurant life so it was tough pickings, but we made it work.

We got up on Saturday morning, ate a small breakfast at the hotel, then headed to Rialto Bridge/Market. We didn't really stay there too long, as we wanted to head to the smaller islands that are off the coast of Venice. First, we went to Murano, which is famous for making/blowing glass. We walked around for 1 hour trying to find a glass blowing demonstration, only to find out that they don't do demonstrations on Saturday. One shop owner told us that Saturday is for making love..so we decided to (not make love and) move on. Then, we realized that we hadn't been looking at anything to buy, so we started to look for something to buy--this took us another hour only to realize that we couldn't afford/didn't want to spend 300-400€ for a vase. But one of those shop owners thought I was Italian so that made my weekend. So, 2 hours later we ended up with a glass candy dish. :( Then, we went onto Burano, which is known for all the houses being painted outrageous colors. For an aspiring photographer (Eric) this place is a dream. I think he took about 150 pictures while we were there. Also, at this time it was like 3pm, and we hadn't eaten since breakfast and I was starting to shut down. We had some pizza, and we were good to go again. We took some more pictures and headed back to Venice. We went back to the hotel, and changed and went out to a nice Italian dinner to celebrate my b-day. After dinner, we went to a place called Harry's (which is a famous bar in Venice, Hemingway used to go there and all the stars go when they are in town) and we got some drinks. I got a Bellini, their signature drink, and Eric had a gin & tonic--each was like 18 euro. With tip, it cost us €40 for 2 drinks. They were closing down when we were finishing our drinks so they had us go out a secret back door (where I'm sure the celebs usually exit). It was totally overpriced, but worth it.

Sunday, we packed up our stuff, ate at the hotel and headed out to explore. This was our day to see Venice. We went to Piazza San Marco, the Doge's Palace, and walked around a ton. Then, we took a Gondola ride--also overpriced, but it was something that we had to do and definitely worth it. We made our way to the airport, had some more Italian food at the airport (even that was amazing) and got home late.

Monday, my actual Birthday, we both had to go to work. But, Eric surprised me with a Chai Tea Latte and pastry from Starbucks in the morning. Then, I came home to some flowers, a cake, a card, and a present. We went to a little Thai place on our street for dinner, and came home and had some cake. It was a quiet but great day, and I felt the love from across the pond!! See more pictures of Venice with the links on the right!