Plucky Survivors See Europe Day 14: Vienna to Venice

I got up at stupid o’clock because I wanted to get to Venice as early as possible and it was going to take me about six hours to make the drive.  Part of me really wanted to stay off the highway because I knew it was going to be a scenic drive, but I’m okay with taking the faster route because it wound up being the most breathtaking, incredible road trip of my life.

If you have an opportunity to make this journey, drop everything and do it.  The highways wind through the Alps of southern Austrian and northern Italy and it is one dramatic vista after another.  There are dozens of tunnels along the route and when you come out of the it’s almost impossible not to gasp.   The pictures and video don’t do it justice.

I made it to the Tronchetto parking garage around 2pm.  I would’ve gotten there earlier, but as soon as I got into Italy, traffic came to a screeching halt.  As I said in the video I posted, there are worse places to get stuck in a 30-minute backup than the Italian Alps.  It was all because of the toll booth, which only had two lanes open, clearly not enough.

The Tronchetto is a massive garage right on the edge of Venice.  I planned ahead with my packing, so I didn’t have to lug two suitcases on a water bus, which meant leaving a bunch of stuff in the car.  This made me splurge (about $200) on “VIP” parking, which is basically where they lock your car in a cage separate from the rest of the garage.  Finding it was not easy, but I feel like it was a good investment.

From there it’s a short walk to the Vaporetto (water bus), which was crowded and hot and noisy, but I was in Venice!!

If you’re going to do this, I highly recommend buying a ticket online through one of the agencies (Google it).  This will allow you to bypass the lines at the ticket machines and go directly to the agency machine, which had nobody waiting.  Punch in your confirmation code and it spits out the ticket, then you scan that at the dock and you’re done.  I skipped ahead of at least two dozen people doing this.

The hotel I’m staying at is right by the Rialto Bridge and there is a water bus stop almost in front of it, so I didn’t have to wheel the suitcase far.

The Hotel Rialto’s foundations date back to the 16th century, but the building itself was built in the 1950s.  It’s gorgeous and traditionally Italian and my room has a balcony that looks directly onto the Rialto Bridge.  Not too shabby.

Although I really wanted to just sit there and enjoy the view, I had a couple of things on my agenda, so I spruced up a bit and headed out for a walk through Venice.  It’s everything I had envisioned it to be.

The city is undeniably gorgeous and romantic as hell, but I do have a couple of quibbles.  The first is the people.  I’m kind of hating being a tourist because I don’t want to get lumped in with the hordes that seem to have absolutely no sense of the fact that there are other people on the planet.

The other is that a lot of the streets feel a lot like a high-end mall.   Pick a brand – I dare you – Fendi, Jimmy Choo, Balenciaga, and on and on.  I know there are areas that have less of this and I hope to explore them tomorrow, but so far I could’ve been in the Grand Canal Shoppes at the Venetian in Vegas, only hotter.

My first stop was at the Venetian Carnival Museum.  This small facility just opened in February, and it has half a dozen rooms with costumes, masks, and art all about Carnival.  It’s a small, but impressive collection.

I hadn’t had any lunch so I was starving and picked the closest restaurant that had tables overlooking the water that had a decent score on Google reviews.

A glass of Pinot Grigio, some oregano heavy flatbread, a much bigger than expected Caesar, and some spaghetti all sounded good, but it was all underwhelming at best.  I’ll do better tomorrow.

After that I walked over to St. Mark’s Square, where I was catching a concert by Jewel.  Yes, “Who Will Save Your Soul” and “Foolish Games” Jewel.

Why is Jewel playing a concert in Venice?  Because Diane Von Furstenburg asked her to.  Seriously, the two are friends and the famed Belgian designer introduced her and everything.  Random.

The show was in a small hall overlooking St. Mark’s Square that held about 150 people.  Jewel looks and sounds amazing and is wryly funny.  After a song during which people clapped along, she said, “I’m going to tell you something about me.  When people clap along, I speed up and slow down the song just to fuck with them.”

After the show, I stopped by the Casino di Venezia, which is housed in a 15^th century renaissance palace along the Grand Canal.  They have tables and slots and there was something undeniably romantic about playing cards in a building like that.  And I walked out with more money than I walked in with so I’m happy.

As I type this, I’m sitting in a chair with the balcony doors open looking at the seagulls and the bridge and the boats and I’m very, very happy I did this.