Day 13 — Venice, in less than a day

Written by Wendy from the road · photographs by Tatiana

We woke up early and hopped on our train to Venice which was about a 4–4.5 hour ride. We upgraded to Business class since it was a long ride and it was totally worth it — the seats were assigned, they were more comfortable, and they served snacks and drinks as well.

Once we arrived in Venice we immediately grabbed a water taxi to get to Hotel San Gallo where we were staying for the night. Definitely not enough time to explore Venice, but we couldn't leave Italy without having seen it. It took us about 25 minutes to get to our hotel by water taxi but it was great because it took us through the whole canal, since we were at the end of it. I knew we weren't going to do the gondola because it was too expensive, so I took all my selfies and photos of the Venice canal during our water taxi ride.

We arrived at our hotel which was super cute and even equipped with more amenities than our other hotels — they even left complimentary fruit and chocolate by our night stand.

Since we had less than a day to explore Venice we ventured out and found C & B Spaghetti where we had some delicious pizza and limoncello spritzes. Afterwards we walked around, took photos of the canal and bridges, and stumbled across the museum of music. We toured Il Museo della Musica di Venezia admiring all the beautiful string instruments, and met a worker there who told us about a concert later that night at the Church of the Pietà where the orchestra would be playing music by Antonio Vivaldi — so we attended.

After that really great concert we had dinner at Bellavista 1976 where we sat outside and enjoyed the view of the water as the sun set. We then went for a stroll when we came across Ristorante Quadri where they were playing live music so we decided to sit down and grab an espresso and some gelato. We were shocked when we got the bill for 70 Euro — but now we know to always look at the menu first.

After that we headed to our hotel to pack up, since we were leaving early in the morning for our final destination, Fiumicino.

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Places from this day

• Venice by Water Taxi — the whole length of the Grand Canal, end to end.
• Hotel San Gallo — super cute, and fruit and chocolate by the bed.
• C & B Spaghetti — delicious pizza and a limoncello spritz.
• Il Museo della Musica di Venezia — a room full of beautiful string instruments.
• Vivaldi at the Church of the Pietà — a tip from the museum, and a really great concert.
• Bellavista 1976 — dinner outside as the sun went down over the water.
• Ristorante Quadri — live music, an espresso, a gelato, and a €70 lesson.