Glass, Masks, and awful flights

Wednesday – December 17, 2008

The coach ride to Florence was pretty. It was sunny outside and we could see the hills and mountains. It was overall a pretty scenic route. When we finally reached Venice about 1 o’clock that afternoon, it was cloudy (of course). We had a little ways to walk and I was little bitter about it because my backpack was so freaking heavy! Finally we walked down this skinny little alleyway to our hotel. Once we got our keys and room numbers (me, Meghan, and Jess were in a room together), we dropped off our stuff and decided to explore.

The first thing I noticed was the multitude of glass stores. There was a ton, selling all sorts of different glass objects like bracelets, necklaces, earrings, figurines, etc. There were also quite a bit of stores that sold the masquerade masks. They were the real deal, too, and expensive I thought. Of course, since Venice is a touristy type place, there were a few souvenir shops but a majority of them sold the glass objects.

I loved the fact that there were bridges everywhere because water ran throughout the whole city. It was great! I really wanted to go on a gondola ride, but it was cold and rainy. One guy saw a group of us walking across a bridge and he yelled out for us to come ride on his gondola..but we just ignored him.

We were all a little hungry so we decided to take a little snack after exploring a little bit. So where do we stop? McDonald’s of course. I mean, what American would pass up the chance to eat Micky D’s when they haven’t had it in almost 4 months?! Can I just tell you, it was one of the best fast food meals I’d ever had. I swear Venetian people make our own chain restaurant food better than we do. They encourage people to sit down and eat; not take it and go. McDonald’s isn’t a fast food restaurant to them as it is to us. It’s nicely furnished on the inside and it’s much more inviting. They even sell beer. It’s crazy. They had a lot of the same items on the menu, some of them were called different things and they had a few extra items. Overall, it was a good place to get a small snack.
We explored a little bit longer but we decided to eat dinner because we thought we had to be back in the hotel by 7. That’s what we heard…that because of the flooding that had been occurring, the hotel locked up at 7 until 11, so we decided we’d rather be inside during all that instead of outside. So we ate at a little Italian place. I had some spaghetti and meatballs. It was pretty good. Then we washed it all down with gelato, of course!

After we got back to the room, some of us got a little restless, because we didn’t want to be cooped up in the room all night, but we stayed anyway. We played cards, listened to music, and even heard a little gossip from some random people. We had a variety of people come in and out of our room that night, and each time they brought some new information about what was currently happening with students or what happened during the semester with various students. It was fabulous! Sandahl and Kelly were even in our room for a while and we all hung out for quite a while. Finally everyone left and we decided to get some sleep so we could explore the next day, since it was our one and only full day in Venice.

Thursday – December 18, 2008

We woke up that morning and ate breakfast at 8:40. That was our designated breakfast time. Their dining room area held only about 6 people at a time, so we had to have specific times we could come eat. The guy down there was really nice and came over and would ask what we wanted: hot chocolate, etc. Then he’d ask how we wanted our eggs cooked and he’d go cook them for us really quick. I drank some hot chocolate and ate some scrambled eggs. It was a nice little breakfast.

Everyone was ready and we met in my room at 9:30. We decided to go to St. Marco (St. Marks) and we were going to use the boat taxi’s to do so. They were actually called the “Boat Bus.” Well unfortunately it was cloudy outside, and we had to deal with the random sprinkling/rain for that day. The taxi ride was cold but enjoyable I guess, haha. Once we got to St. Marks, we wandered about for a little bit, and then enjoyed some souvenir shops. It had started raining a little more at this point. We decided to walk back to more familiar territory. We looked at some shops on the way back but a majority of them were glass shops like we’d seen before. We ate lunch at…guess where? McDONALDS! Because it was just so gosh darn good the first time! Afterwards we wandered around for a little while longer and looked at more souvenir places.

Being in Venice is wonderful, but after about a day there isn’t much more to do. Coming from Rome and Florence when it’s jam packed with adventure and exploration…Venice is a little boring after a day. We could have gone to see where they make the Murano glass but we heard it was expensive and decided not to. Since there wasn’t a whole lot more to do, we decided it was nap time! So we went back to the room and hung out a little bit. We napped too, until about 6:30. Then we decided it was time for dinner.

Jessica and I wanted to eat pizza pasta since it was our last night in Italy but we didn’t want to be fat kids and eat one each ourselves, so we split both! It was a great decision and our meal was absolutely wonderful. We enjoyed each other’s company for a while and had a good time winding down. The only thing about the Italian food I didn’t care too much for, was the bread they automatically gave you and charged you for. I thought it was bland and not very tasty. I definitely prefer French bread to Italian. Silly that they charge us for it and we don’t even eat it half the time or ask for it!

It had stopped raining so we bought some gelato one last time and decided to enjoy it while standing on a bridge and looking at the water. It was dark at this point and we were all pretty slap happy. At one point Adrienne was filming us saying something really retarded and these 2 guys approached us and were trying to sell glow in the dark items and in unison, after the first word the guy said, all of us yelled “NO!” and the guys got the hint really quickly and walked off. On the video Adrienne made, you could hear it all happen, it was sooooo funny. It was definitely a great moment. Other than that, we just continued to act a little stupid and enjoy the rest of the night.

When we made it back to the room, we decided to play some cards. Jeff came upstairs to join us because he loved the new card game we had taught him while in Florence. He ended up doing really well and beating me continuously. So we all played cards for a while and then Jeff left and I decided to shower. Jessica French braided my hair when I got out, because I like my hair French braided before we travel since it’s much easier to contain that way. Everyone packed up their stuff and then went to bed. Travel days are never that much fun and for some reason are always exhausting.

Friday – December 19, 2008

We woke up and got ready. I ate breakfast at 7:00 a.m. It wasn’t anything much. After I finished eating, we went back to the room and got our stuff. Finally, everyone was ready to go and at 8:00 we started the walk back to the coach. It was a beautiful morning. It was definitely the best day we had in Venice. The sun was rising, and we could watch the vibrant colors dance across the sky. It was wonderful. I stopped to snap a few pictures…wishing it looked like that the whole trip.

We loaded up the coach, got situated, and then headed out to the airport. We got there about half an hour later. Let me tell you, the whole experience flying back home was awful. We had so many delays, and flights pushed back. We missed our second flight because of all the delays coming out of Venice. We had to wait until 6pm for our flight and because we were just circling the sky for 45 minutes trying to touch down. It was awful and dragged out way too long. By that point, I was just ready to be home so it didn’t add to the stress levels.

Finally we made it to Heathrow airport in London. We had to go and pick up our luggage that we had left with Harlaxton. Doug was there (my favorite shuttle driver) so we all hugged him once last time as we grabbed our luggage. Well, then we heard that the students who went on the Italy trip Option 2, their flight from Rome to Heathrow was cancelled. So we didn’t know what they were going to do because some of them had flights with us from Option 1. Some students guarded all Option 1’s luggage, as well as Bronwyn.

Well, me and my friends decided to weigh our bags and redistribute our luggage. I was screwed because mine was way too heavy but I wasn’t sure what to do. I ended up just using a duffel bag I had packed, and put all the heavy stuff into that. Technically I was going to be checking 3 bags which was going to cost some extra money. I didn’t care at that point.

After we finished, we all created a huge bed on the floor with sleeping bags, and jackets and everyone tried to sleep for a few hours. It didn’t work for me very well.


Saturday – December 20, 2008

Finally around 6am, I got up. Jon Harvey came to see us and so we all got to say bye. But me and a few of my friends had to pack up and head to terminal 4, so we separated from the group. It was sad to leave them. But we hugged and said our farewells and headed our separate ways. Jon helped out a little bit with some of our bags, which was nice.

We went and checked in, and I ended up having to dish out 135pounds ($200) in extra fees for my luggage. Sheeeesh! I about died. I paid it, and headed on my way with everyone. Finally at 8am, we boarded the plane. The flight was about 8 hours and I watched 2 movies since It’s always hard for me sleep: Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 & The Notebook.

Finally we arrived back to the states and I was freaking out a little bit because of Customs. I had a few Cuban cigars in my luggage as a gift for Josh. I didn’t want to get arrested! I was randomly chosen (as well as Daniel) to go through a special customs area, and so I was really freaking out then. I told the security guard that I had some cigars that I had written down on my customs form but they were Italian, and for someone as a gift. He put my bags in this huge Agriculture scanner, and sent me on my way. It worked out fine. Daniel wasn’t so lucky though, he was trying to bring Absinthe back and they confiscated it.

After security and customs was finished, a few of us wanted to eat lunch and there was a Chili’s, so we decided to grub on some good ol’ American food. Me, Adrienne, Sarah Hood, and Daniel Brown ate together at a table. We just chatted and enjoyed each others company. When we finished, we headed to our terminal for a while and just chilled out waiting for the flight.

Several hours later, I was landing in Louisville and was greeted by my grandma, mom, and her boyfriend at the time: Dennis. It was great to be home! I said bye to Adrienne, as she greeted her family and went on my way home.

It was the best experience of my life. I wouldn’t have traded it for any other time in this world.



--I heard later that Option 2 students had to reschedule their flights and had to live in the airport for a few days. Some didnt' even get back home until almost Christmas Eve. So I was lucky!!