Bologna and Venice--sorry for the sideways pictures, again.

Yesterday was quite an adventure in terms of baggage.  We had to carry all of our bags: 3 suitcases (each about 40 lbs), 3 carry-ons, and 2 purses down 6 flights of stairs and through the quartier to Les Halles metro station.  Once at Les Halles, we had to drag it down 3 escalators to the RER platform.  All while keeping track of Aidan, who was especially sleepy since we were doing this at about 7 am.  We got on the RER only to discover after 1 stop that although it was the RER 2, it didn't terminate at Charles de Gaulle Airport, so we had to get off that train and get on the next one.

Once we arrived at the airport, we couldn't get out of the RER station because somehow the tickets we had used to get on the train were not the correct ones.  A not so courteous SNCF man helped us buy our tickets at the gate so we could exit the station.  When we arrived at the EasyJet counter, we discovered that EasyJet only allows 1 carry on (and not 1 carry on and 1 personal bag), but the EJ lady was very courteous and checked our carry ons for free.

The flight to Bologna was easy and uneventful, as was the taxi ride to the apartment.  The first thing we noticed about Bologna was how hot it was--93!  We'd been suffering through 50 degrees and rainy for 8 days, so this change came as quite a shock to our systems.  We had to wait about an hour for our landlord's father to come and check us into the apartment.  It is small, but quiet and secure.  And, it has air conditioning!!!

Aidan , hot and sweaty, in the tourism office

Piazza Maggiore

The outside of our apartment

Bologna

We explored Bologna.  Learned about this mysterious Italian 'service' charge at restaurants called copperto. The city is very cute.  Very orange.  With lots of Renaissance and medieval buildings.  Our apartment is about a 10 minute (w. causal pace) walk from Piazza Maggiore, the main square.  It is quite a distance to the train station, which we have to visit daily in order to do all of our side trips, but we're becoming quite familiar w. the inexpensive and easy to use Bologna bus system.

Today, we missed our train to Venice, but easily got the next train.  Venice was a mixed bag for us.  All of us enjoyed the high speed train, which got us from Bologna to Vencie (about 100 miles) in about an hour.  When you arrive in Venice, you have to take a water bus called a Vaporetto to get to the islands that make up the city.  Because we were only going to be there for the day, we only got tickets for San Marco island, which is the island that has St. Marc's square and most of the other well known sites in Venice.  Melinda wanted to see the Murano glass factory, but it was on another island.  The Vaporetto is a great ride-- it's kind of like taking a harbor tour.  Although it was very hot today, being on a boat in the breeze feels great!

I absolutely hated  Venice.  It was ridiculously crowded with tourists--Italians were beyond rare in the city.  Even our waiters were foreigners.  (Bologna on the other hand is almost void of tourists!)  I felt like I was trapped in a theme park and couldn't wait to leave.  Although I appreciated the architecture and the layout of the city, I couldn't enjoy it.  Aidan felt similarly too-- although we both thorougly enjoyed the trek to the top of one of the towers in the St. Mark's Square, which provided us with a 360 degree panoramic view of the city and the water.  Melinda didn't do the tower, she stayed in the square and got reprimanded by someone for sitting on steps in a public square (something that thousnads, literarlly thousands, of other people were doing at the same time).  She fell in love with all the Murano glass in the coutnless shops that line the streets.  I think she could have easily spent thoushands of euro on jewelry.

Melinda had always wanted to take a private boat (a la James Bond), so she sprung for a private water taxi (not cheap at all) that took us from the island to the train station.  It was the highlight of her and Aidan's trip to Venice.  They felt like they were starring in an action movie.  It didn't hurt that Melinda thought our water taxi driver was quite easy on the eyes!!

After another high speed train ride back to Bologna, we came home to get to bed early.  We leave for Sienna (a medieval city that Aidan's really been looking forward to) tomorrow quite early.