Day 13&14- Crumbled Glory

So I'm a few days behind, but I couldn't find internet anywhere. Sunday morning we left Switzerland, right around 6AM. One long long long ride later, we were in Venice, city of lights. No, wait, that's what, Paris?

Venice, city of Venice. The Grand Canal was Grand. Claudio and I took the water bus down it, which was sort of like a poor man's version of a tour. There were a lot of really cool buildings that I don't have time to post pictures of. We got off next to this big church at the opposite end of the city that we'd started on. We walked back towards the hotel, walking through really cool narrow streets full of shops and mini restaurants.

A Venetian shop will sell only one of four things, pizza, gelato, masks, or glass. Many of you know this, but for those who don't, Venice has no proper streets, but canals and walkways that crisscross each other. If you're not willing to shill out 80 euros for a gondola (I wanted to but Claudio wasn't having it... Kidding) its a lot of walking. Of course I've gotten used to this in Europe.

Venice is beautiful, it really is, but you can tell its long past its glory days. The water of the canals is filthy, and is full of trash and bottles. The buildings look grand, but several are old and crumbling. And of course the city is sinking, but let us not linger on that.

The Gelato(sp?) ranked amongst the best ice creams I've ever had. The pizza was good, but hey, it's Italy. I really just liked walking around the narrow streets, listening to the Gondoliers try to get us to ride their boats, and of course watching the boats themselves. I still don't know how they manage them with so few strokes. My running theory is they have a track system like a roller coaster.

In fact, I'm waiting for the day when Venice becomes a giant lazy river. I cannot wait. I was so excited because the restaurant we chose for dinner had rice served with squid ink. Those of you in the know know that I've been wanting to try something like this forever. Alas, they were out. I had spagetti instead. I felt like such a tourist.

We went back to the hotel so that Claudio could take a dump, and then he decided he wanted to go back out into the town to find some dessert. At this point we'd nearly gotten lost on the way back, and now we didn't have the setting sun to guide us back. We did make our way back safely enough though.

The next day was more of the same, we visited a couple of very cool churches, and I didn't know if I was allowed in since I wasn't catholic. We caught a train at 8 to France, and the sleeper car was none too pleasant. Essentially the train car turned into a smelly sauna when it stopped and they turned the air off.

We got into Aix around 11, and then went looking for Tim. We didn't get his phone number for no apparent reason, and Claudio thought we could find him by just looking around. We found an Italian Cafe with WiFi and told Tim to meet us at the big fountain. We found him, and have been sitting in his bed room ever since. His host mother is making us dinner, and then Tim said something about booze. I don't know.

Anywho, see you all later!
-Chase