Our Room in Venice
Stefano was very friendly and led us to the building where we would be staying. The apartment had four bedrooms and a kitchen and bathroom. Our bedroom was a large comfortable room overlooking a canal with a row of small boats tied up.

It was great to have a kitchen because eating at restaurants in Venice can be pricey – even pricier than a hotel room! Once we put down our backpacks we asked Stefano if there were any grocery stores nearby. He said yes and offered to show us where the nearest on was. We followed him down some more twisting turning narrow streets until we came to a small grocery store. He bid us goodbye and we got to our food shopping.

We bought a long loaf of bread (Italian bread, oddly enough), cheese, sardines, tomatoes, and cereal. I also scouted out the Italian beer and wine selection and came away with three cans of local beer (a sampling of brands I had never seen before) and a cheap bottle of white wine. We managed to purchase our items without a language problem and even find our way back to our lovely little apartment.
After we snacked on our goodies we were itching to get back out there and be typical American tourists gawking at every plaster wall with exposed brick. Our room was only a block from the wide promenade that ran along the San Marco Basin, which was always busy with boat traffic.

Within ten minutes we were back in San Marco Piazza, a major tourist attraction. I had read that this square was often flooded with several inches of water (acqua alta – high water in Italian) so I brought galoshes just in case. I even found a video on Youtube with tourists wading around the Piazza in two feet of water! Luckily, the square was high and dry while we were there and I could concentrate on my tourist snapshots. We also walked past the Bridge of Sighs, which I only knew of previously because it was the name of a Robin Trower album – unfortunately, it was completely was completely obscured by renovation scaffolding and I was only able to get a good look at it by buying a post card!

This time we had more time to appreciate the San Marco Basilica and the Palazzo Ducale right next door and a mob of horrible picture taking tourists that I shamelessly became a part of. After that it was a bit of a blur – more narrow streets and gondola boats everywhere we turned!
When we finally made it back to our domicile, we met the other tenants of the apartment. As I mentioned earlier, there were several visiting printmakers who were staying in the apartment – one from London, England, one from Romania and two from America. They were all interesting people who didn’t mind a glass of wine now and again, which was good because I prefer my drink with a bit of conversation.

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