We had planned on staying one more day and night here in Venice, but after talking over our plans last night we decided that after seeing what we saw today we would be ready to move on to Florence a day early. We had a typical day starting picnic breakfast and lunch made from a tuna and veggies mix and bread we bought at the camp sight store. We are getting this "eating for cheap" thing down pretty good! Hopefully we can find more little stores in the other cities because the food in the tourist area is a few euros more, which in the end will add up quite a bit!
The rest of our day didn't go as we had planned, but turned out nice anyway, I mean heck, we are in Italy! We had planned to take a boat to some other islands outside of Venice, but after finding out that it would put us over our budget for the day we decided to wander the back roads of Venice and see what life is like outside of the tourist areas. It was a LOT of walking and by the end of the day we were soooo ready to head back to our camp and sit for a while. SInce we saved the $$ on not going on our little excursion we decided to splurge on some Ice cream! Ashley had chocolate and mint (2 scoops) and I had lemon and strawberry. For some reason we were extra hungry today so it was extra yummy! We sat on the ground, leaning against a building that was probably built 100's of years ago and watched the locals walk their dogs, the tourists pull out there maps and wonder where they were, and of course, the street vendors trying to make a euro from anyone who walked by.
I really loved being on the back streets for a few reasons. First, it seems like 90% of the people here smoke and it was really getting to my head. The only way to get away from it is to find a less populated area and take a break. The other reason I loved these back roads is because we could see a little more of what Venice really is, not just the tourist "buy this, and buy that" areas, but the little grocery store that sells water for ,60 euros rather than the 2,50 in the shops. Or the Coke Zero in a really cool Italian can for less than a euro. We saw laundry hanging out to dry because it was a beautiful sunny day. We saw lots of cute little dogs walking their owners and commented on how they all seemed to have a very distinct personality. I think that the dogs here are such a part of the family and are so socialized that they really take on a humanistic personality. It was really fun to watch them and see how they look at their owners, and even others as if they ruled the place.
After eventually finding our way back to our dock for the boat back to camp we had a while to wait and found our favorite little bench tucked away in a little alley just off the main area. We rested and had some water and little wafer cookies we got at the grocery store and soon enough it was time for our boat! Ashley waved Arevaderci(?) to Venice and we were off! I think we were most excited to make it to our campground because the bathrooms here are free, instead of the 1,50 euros in the city! Needless to say we saved a few euros today and were happy to be back to free toilets :)
Since we are leaving here in the morning we took some time and 8euros to do our laundry. It's too cold to hang it to dry, so we figured it's an expense we'd have to deal with. We just finished sharing a pizza at the cafe here and are sitting in the chilly wifi area to catch up, make travel plans for tomorrow and upload photos!
Oh yeah, one more thing I bought at the grocery store was a Italian dark chocolate bar to share with family when we get home! Woot! We will have to see if it is any better than the dark chocolate at home :)
As always, love you all, and miss you tons! We are good, and happy and tired and not hungry at the moment, so no worries! Soon our laundry will be dry and we will get our things ready to check out in the morning and board the train to Florence! Yihee!
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