Venezia!

We're still in the process of moving all my stuff from my old computer to my new one, but I was able to transfer some pics on a thumb drive to upload a few. :) 

I took over 700 photos in Europe and I'm sure that's no surprise to you. ;) Picking some of my favs was really hard, but I realize the highlight of your day is not looking through 300 photos of my vacation, sooooo I tried to narrow. :) I landed in London on Wednesday and Lauren and I took off for Venice on Thursday afternoon, so I thought I'd just do one whole post dedicated to Venice and maybe one or two dedicated to London. 

We spent Thursday afternoon-Saturday morning in Venice and got to experience SO much! We arrived, checked in to our fabulous hotel right on the Grand Canal then immediately set off to explore. We grabbed a couple of cokes (fending off my jet lag) from a local cafe and were off to take in our first views of Venezia! That night, we enjoyed a fabulous dinner right off the Grand Canal with a view of the Rialto Bridge. The next morning, we explored the local market, St. Mark's Basilica, Doge's Palace, Frari Church (breathtaking), St. Mark's Campanile (the bell tower), and every adorable little street in between. We had fabulous food-from local pastas to gelato to espresso to wine. We even got to experience a real Venetian flood! Photos to follow, but it was actually a really cool experience that I'm glad we got to have.

The photos recap our trip better than I ever could in words, so here goes...

Postcard views in absolutely every direction. 

Our fantastic hotel, the Foscari Palace. 

St. Mark's Square

Playing paparazzi during this couple's romantic gondola ride. 

Little cafes line the adorable stone streets. While many modern storefronts take over street level, a quick glance above them reminds you of the amazingly charming and historical architecture all around. 

Good morning from the Rialto Bridge!

This was the view in almost every direction on every little pedestrian bridge...approximately every 500 feet. Impossible not to be blown away. We often didn't even know where to look first because we were so in awe of everything around us!

Venice is very small, but the streets wind, turn and criss cross! Lauren's navigation skills saved us. I was snapping photos nonstop while she actually figured out where the heck we were going... haha... 

Crowded St. Mark's! I was standing in front of St. Mark's Basilica facing the place where I'd stood the night before to get the night photo (above) :) Also, note the bench-looking things. We were so oblivious, we thought those were for a presentation or something. No. Those were set up because Venice was about to flood (we had no idea) and folks walk on them when the water rises! 

View above St. Mark's from the bell tower 

It's raining; it's pouring! 

Awesome little restaurant where we had the BEST server who brought us lots of wine...which is probably why we didn't realize flood sirens were going off overnight...haha...

Well worth the 10 euros in order to keep my pants dry en route to the water taxi/airport :)

Walking down the street to the water taxi! See- people are walking on those concrete things!

Flood? No big deal in Venice! Everyone just keeps on keepin' on. This is NOWHERE near as deep as the flood can get. Google some pics if you're curious! It's crazy! 

Yeah, that's someone's door. 

I think I fell in love with Italy...flood and all. I want to go back and see Florence, Pisa, Rome, and so much more. I've already been talking to Eric about a potential one year anniversary trip and we're not even married yet...haha... (We'll probably do a beach for our honeymoon, but that's still TBD). Sure, Venice was touristy in some regards... I mean if you don't run a gondola, restaurant, shop, or hotel, there probably isn't much for you in Venice in terms of work. So, of course it's packed with tourists. But, the history, people, architecture, food all just make it so easy to look past the rest of the tourists and feel like you've just stepped back in time to one of the most beautiful places in the world. I'm so thankful that I got to visit Lauren and that she and I were able to do a little side trip to this fabulous city!