The big day arrived and the taxi picked us up at 7am to catch the 07.30 from Lincoln Central to Venice. Of course trains don’t go to Venice from Lincoln but it was a step on the journey:
Home – Lincoln Central – London Kings Cross – London Bridge (by Northern Line) – Gatwick – Venice Marco Polo airport – water taxi – Hotel L’Orologio
We bumped into Andy and Suddy Davidson in Gatwick which was a nice surprise. They were off to Faro for the weekend. We had a coffee with them in the business lounge. Lunch on the plane included a couple of chamagnes and a nice Chilean red (fair play).
Venice was all it was billed to be. If you ever go don’t mess about with public transport from the airport. The private water taxi ride was totally terrific. It took us to the hotel’s own mooring. Effortless. The only way to arrive. Later we went for a stroll to the (boarded over and largely “under construction”) and saw people hauling cases through the streets looking for their hotel. Don’t bother love. Water taxi it.
Dinner was a 40 minute water bus (Vedetti – E7.50 ew) away at Corte Sconta. Google told us it would be quicker to walk but we didn’t want to risk it in the dark on our first night in town. The restaurant was down a small alley (everywhere is a small alley). I bought a local TIM data sim – E30 for 5GB PAYG. LTE. Great experience out of the box. It has already been very handy. It’s mostly goingto be used for maps, translate and perhaps for downloading visitors guides.
Dinner was great – look out for a trip advisor review. Everything was great. Our room looks out over the Grand Canal – lots to see, lots going on. We are just next to the Venice fish market. Look out for pics from Saturday.
My final observation for today is that you really can see that the sea level has risen, or the city has sunk. The water is lapping over pavements that should obviously be higher. Let’s hope they have a handle on the sitch. Featured pic is of two gondolas fwiw.