August 1

Of course we made it through the night on our trip from Nice to Venice. We suffered only minor annoyances like being awakened from a dead sleep by a conductor intent on making sure our ticket was valid, but otherwise we were fine.

We arrived in the early morning to discover it was hot (yeah, duh, Italy in August), but also extremely humid. Ugh. Welcome to Venice.

We found our hotel without too much trouble and dropped our bags. First on our list was finding a "bus" to Murano where all the fancy glass-blowing takes place. When I say "bus" I really mean "boat packed with people in imminent danger of capsizing." Lovely.

Murano is an island off Venice and home to a million and one glass shops. The bad ones sold cheesy t-shirts and glass beads while the good ones had beautiful pieces far out of our price range. The best ones, though, had air-conditioning.

We were there to find a piece for Amy's mother for the center of her table. Long and hard we worked, tromping from one spot to the next until we found the piece of destiny. It was blue from top to bottom with silver bubbles rising as if from the floor of the ocean. We hemmed and hawed until the "boss" came in to try to sell us. In the end we decided we'd need to take a walk to think it over.

I'm pretty sure they knew we'd be back and promised we could have a "special deal" on our return. We wandered around discussing our special system for getting the best deal when we got back. When we returned the salesperson made a couple of calls to the "boss" which likely included the words "suckers" and "silly Americans." In the end we brought them down about $30 and walked out with a huge box packed with styrofoam, bubble wrap, and three free glass candy things.

We dropped the vase at the hotel and headed to St. Mark's to see the piazza and the basilica it's named for. The line was very long, but moved pretty quickly and it was, after all, free. The only thing that really caused delays were dress code violations for short shorts or revealing tops. They dug in their packs at the security check forcing the good girls like Amy (already in long pants and a long-sleeved shirt) sweated it out, literally.

The basilica itself was marvelous. When Venice was rich it spent much of its wealth on public works like St. Mark's. The inside of the dome was done in beautiful mosaics with real gold showing the bible scenes. The floors were an intricate pattern of marble that so closely resembled Amy's quilts that she started sketching out patterns for later use.

We crossed Academia bridge which wasn't as interesting as it had been made out to be, but the Rialto bridge was more. On the top of the Rialto bridge were tons of little shops and a million or so tourists.

We ate at a little shop off St. Mark's square. I had my first real Italian food, though it was probably more touristy food than authentic food. We wandered back to the hotel for a quite night's sleep.

One of our few one-night stays, Venice gives way to the Cinque Terre.