We Made it to Venice!
Ciao!!!
We are finally here!!! Most of us left from Saskatoon on Saturday, March 3. Many of us travelled in to Saskatoon the night before to avoid the big snowstorm that was predicted. As it turns out, the snow didn’t begin until 9:00 am on Saturday. We thought we were home free!! Our plane was due to depart at 11:10 am. Once we were all on the plane, they informed us that there was too much snow to do the de-icing, some had to sit and wait for the snow to let up! At that point, I was a bit worried, knowing that the snow was supposed to continue falling through Sunday!!! Well, eventually they had a short window of opportunity, so away we went but we departed 80 minutes late! That cut our connection time down in Toronto to about 40 minutes! Yikes!! In the meantime, I was busy texting three other parties that were departing from Edmonton, Calgary and Regina, keeping them informed about our situation and advising them of what to do once they arrived in Toronto! It was with great relief when we arrived at our international gate in Toronto with enough time to use the restroom and get right on the plane bound for Frankfurt!!! The best news is that all of the others were there, waiting for us!!
When we arrived in Frankfurt, it wa the usual Frankfurt “dog and pony show - I don’t like FF airport”! We managed to make find our way through the craziness, just in time to walk right onto our final flight to Venice (no restroom stop this time)!
We arrived in Venice at 10:30 am and our Tour Director, Laura, was waiting for us. Arrival into Venice is very different as we don’t hop on a bus to go to our hotel, we get on water taxis. Our luggage was sent on a separate boat and we divided up among three water taxis and rode about 20 minutes to Venice. There are no roads or vehicles in Venice, so this is the only way in!!
We were dropped off very near to our hotel. Our rooms were not yet ready so we left our carry on bags at the hotel and ventured off to grab some lunch. Then we met up with Laura and she led us on a short walking tour to the main square (Piazza San Marco). If you look at the pictures, you will see that we are a bit in a daze, as we were all very tired. We then went on our gondola ride because the weather forecast was better for today (Sunday) than tomorrow. Barb and Peiter enjoyed the “romantic” gondola ride while the rest of us enjoyed “romantic ride with 5 of your best friends” ride. We had a boat in the center of our group with an accordion player and a singer to serenade us! It was wonderful!!! You will also see that Venice was veiled in fog for the first part of our tour and that gave it a lovely, ominous feeling!!! The really good news is that later the sun came out and made it spectacular!!!
After this we got to check into our rooms and have a bit of a rest (and a chance to warm up) before we regrouped for a welcome drink (Prosecco) and a briefing meeting. We then walked from the hotel to a lovely restaurant for our dinner. It was warm and cozy and the meal was delicious! Our “starter” course was lasagna (that’s how they do it in Italy), followed by the second course of chicken and mushrooms with a salad, all topped off with Tirimisu for dessert. Oh ya.....can’t forget about the carafes of red wine!!!
We were all ready to get back to the hotel and find our beds as it had been a long time since we saw one of those!!!
We are finally here!!! Most of us left from Saskatoon on Saturday, March 3. Many of us travelled in to Saskatoon the night before to avoid the big snowstorm that was predicted. As it turns out, the snow didn’t begin until 9:00 am on Saturday. We thought we were home free!! Our plane was due to depart at 11:10 am. Once we were all on the plane, they informed us that there was too much snow to do the de-icing, some had to sit and wait for the snow to let up! At that point, I was a bit worried, knowing that the snow was supposed to continue falling through Sunday!!! Well, eventually they had a short window of opportunity, so away we went but we departed 80 minutes late! That cut our connection time down in Toronto to about 40 minutes! Yikes!! In the meantime, I was busy texting three other parties that were departing from Edmonton, Calgary and Regina, keeping them informed about our situation and advising them of what to do once they arrived in Toronto! It was with great relief when we arrived at our international gate in Toronto with enough time to use the restroom and get right on the plane bound for Frankfurt!!! The best news is that all of the others were there, waiting for us!!
When we arrived in Frankfurt, it wa the usual Frankfurt “dog and pony show - I don’t like FF airport”! We managed to make find our way through the craziness, just in time to walk right onto our final flight to Venice (no restroom stop this time)!
We arrived in Venice at 10:30 am and our Tour Director, Laura, was waiting for us. Arrival into Venice is very different as we don’t hop on a bus to go to our hotel, we get on water taxis. Our luggage was sent on a separate boat and we divided up among three water taxis and rode about 20 minutes to Venice. There are no roads or vehicles in Venice, so this is the only way in!!
We were dropped off very near to our hotel. Our rooms were not yet ready so we left our carry on bags at the hotel and ventured off to grab some lunch. Then we met up with Laura and she led us on a short walking tour to the main square (Piazza San Marco). If you look at the pictures, you will see that we are a bit in a daze, as we were all very tired. We then went on our gondola ride because the weather forecast was better for today (Sunday) than tomorrow. Barb and Peiter enjoyed the “romantic” gondola ride while the rest of us enjoyed “romantic ride with 5 of your best friends” ride. We had a boat in the center of our group with an accordion player and a singer to serenade us! It was wonderful!!! You will also see that Venice was veiled in fog for the first part of our tour and that gave it a lovely, ominous feeling!!! The really good news is that later the sun came out and made it spectacular!!!
After this we got to check into our rooms and have a bit of a rest (and a chance to warm up) before we regrouped for a welcome drink (Prosecco) and a briefing meeting. We then walked from the hotel to a lovely restaurant for our dinner. It was warm and cozy and the meal was delicious! Our “starter” course was lasagna (that’s how they do it in Italy), followed by the second course of chicken and mushrooms with a salad, all topped off with Tirimisu for dessert. Oh ya.....can’t forget about the carafes of red wine!!!
We were all ready to get back to the hotel and find our beds as it had been a long time since we saw one of those!!!
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