La Vita in Venice
After my month-long visit to Venice, Italy, I have reaffirmed my love for this beautiful country! Italy was always a dream of mine as a little girl, and it’s safe to say, it did NOT disappoint. Italy absolutely lives up to its name and I’m sure anyone who visits this country, will know exactly what I mean.
Venice is a gorgeous city on water. I was stunned by its beauty the minute I stepped foot off Constitution Bridge. It was amazing to see how the locals live being that their city is surrounded by water. There are no cars past Piazzale Roma, of course, so I was able to see how locals have adapted almost every service vehicle we have, to boats. I saw several types of boats during my time here. They have police boats, emergency boats, ambulance boats, garbage boats that go around and collect the garbage off the edge of the streets, and freight boats!
Spending a month there, I got to know the city pretty well. The directional signs on their buildings made it so easy to get around by walking. It was common to see locals more in the streets than taking the vaporetto. This could be because they both took the same amount of time, it’s just the Vaporetto saves you from a lot of walking.
While in Venice, I got to explore a lot of the city plus make a couple of day trips, which you don’t think is quite possible considering where Venice is in Italy. My adventures in the city took me to the Leonardo Da Vinci Museum, where I learned just how talented and intelligent he was, plus it was interactive, and I loved that I was able to immerse myself in his history and experience his inventions. I also walked into several locally owned businesses, which in Venice is quite normal if you’re anywhere outside of the main shopping street. You won’t find designer brand stores or department stores on every corner and that is one of the things I loved the most about Venice. It was so easy to shop local!
We made sure to take a tour of a glass blowing factory in Murano and visit the colorful island of Burano! The Murano Glass tour we did took us behind the scenes of the factory where we were able to see a glassblower at work! He showed us how they made the famous Murano glasses and a simple standing horse, which shocked me that it took him about 5 minutes to make. I was stunned as I got off the vaporetto in Burano, to see just how colorful everything was, and how well-kept the paint on the houses was. You quickly find Burano is a very small island because it won’t take you long to walk from one end to the other but on your way to the edge, you’ll come across a few picturesque bridges!
Another great highlight of my stay in Italy were the day trips! I took two day trips during this “workcation” to the cities of Florence and Milan.
My day in Florence consisted of a few hours exploring the central market, which was probably my favorite stop this day as it was filled with locals selling Italian goodies and the second floor was a food court with a bar in the center. We grabbed a quick pasta here and were able to watch the pasta-makers in action, this plus the taste of the pasta quickly took the number one spot in my rankings of the best pasta I’ve ever had! We figured gelato would be a great way to finish our lunch off, so we made our way to Florence’s oldest gelato shop, Vivoli.
After this we went off to do some sightseeing. We stopped at Palazzo Vecchio, where you’ll find a copy of Michelangelo’s David along with other beautiful sculptures. Next was Ponte Vecchio, which is very famous for its shops along the bridge and can get quite crowded even in the off season. From Ponte Vecchio we walked to Piazzale Michelangelo, where you can find the best view of all of Florence. We had a seat at one of the patio restaurants and enjoyed the view for a few hours until it was time to make our way back to the train station to head back to Venice.
As for Milan, I did this one as a solo daytrip. I would recommend this city to anyone doing solo travel, especially women, as it was quite possibly the safest and most friendly places I had visited. Not to say that Venice and Florence weren’t, but I felt a lot more taken care of by workers when they saw that I was traveling alone.
My first sightseeing stop was the Pinacoteca di Brera, an art museum with a small interior plaza with a beautiful sculpture in the center and gorgeous architecture surrounding it. Following that, I walked over to the Sforzesco Castle. This huge castle had so much to admire, from its great red sandstone walls surrounding the castle to the Castello fountain in front of the castle. I walked over to the very famous Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II and stood in awe of the beautiful architecture in this shopping mall. Of course, I also participated in some window shopping of the big designer brands there, and then I went off to my next stop, Duomo di Milano. I had no time to stop and take a tour of the inside, but I took in as much of the view from the Piazza del Duomo as possible.
So, I left Italy with a piece of my heart staying in Venice, a whole bunch of knowledge, and a few Italian words and phrases to help me get a glass of wine and asking for the check! I can’t wait for my next trip out to Italy to see more of its beautiful cities and towns.
I’d love to help you get to Italy and see this all for yourself!
Krislanny Flores
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