Vacate to Venice 2019 - Exploring San Marco & San Polo

Without the rush to catch a vaporetto to go to a more distant island, we awoke more slowly, enjoying a nice breakfast of fruit we picked up at the market the night before. On our walk to San Marco Basilica, we stopped for some croissants to supplement our fruit breakfast. While Kari preferred the warmth of the croissants from the day prior, I felt these croissants were better quality, a little lighter and fluffier. I also had a hot chocolate. Throughout Venice, we had seen these hot chocolate machines constantly turning liquid chocolate. What a better way to start a brisk morning walking around Venice than with a croissant and a hot chocolate. It was delicious!

Once we arrived at San Marco Basilica, we left our bags and began the climb to the museum above the church. As beautiful and grand as the exterior was, the interior was even more beautiful. The walls and ceilings were adorned with scenes from the Bible and church history in mosaic. Around each image was gold leaf mosaic tiles to serve as a consistent background for the ceiling. Absolutely stunning! Unfortunately, they requested no photos, so we only snagged a couple to help remember for ourselves.

Walking through the museum was like walking through the history of the church. We saw various pieces going through restoration and some of the techniques used to preserve the Basilica for years to come. We also saw some of the pieces that started to become too damaged in their prior place to remain, such as the Horses of Saint Mark. These were replaced by replicas to maintain the look without losing the originals due to weathering over time.

In addition to seeing the beauty of the church from above, we could hear morning mass proceeding below us. It was quite lovely and cool to think this building is still being used for its original purpose many centuries later.

After descending back to ground level, we were given the opportunity to enter the main portion where mass was occurring to use the confessional or seek a blessing. Kari and I, being not catholic, did not feel comfortable spoiling the sanctity of the space and left. We headed off to collect our belongings and continue our tour of Piazza San Marco.

Our next stop was the Doge's Palace, or Palazzo Ducale. Similar to San Marco Basilica, a portion was turned into a large museum to show the history of the culture. In addition to serving as the residence for the doge, or political leader for the Venetian people, it was also the home for the legislative and judicial branches of their government. With the former government being a republic similar to our own, it had three branches: executive, legislative, and judicial. It is cool to see one of the likely examples/influences to our founding fathers when forming our government.

As we wandered through various halls and rooms, we were struck by the beauty and ornate decorations. Many of the walls and ceilings were covered with paintings and carvings or sculptures. It was spectacular. The final stop in our tour was across the Bridge of Sighs and into the new prison. Named the Bridge of Sighs due to the thought prisoners would sigh as they crossed, glimpsing freedom one last time before entering the dark, damp prison. It was an interesting view to see through the small windows out at San Giorgio's, watching gondolas pass below us on the canal.

Now, we have been touring museums for a few hours building a healthy appetite. We opted to try one of the recommendations from Lauren and Jesse, Dal Moro's, a grab and go pasta place. I had spaghetti with bolognese sauce, chicken, and parmesan cheese. Kari had spaghetti with black fish sauce and parmesan cheese. The food was hot and delicious, just what we needed after spending a few hours roaming the cool drafty halls of the Doge's Palace.

Following lunch, we wandered over to Suso's for our first gelato of the day; another recommendation from Lauren and Jesse. This was one of the better gelatos we had tried. The fruit di bosco was excellent and the lemon was pretty good.

With food in our bellies, we set off to find a gondola ride. We tried to find one on one of the small canals, hoping for a more peaceful and serene ride than solely on the Grand Canal. That turned out to be a good choice. While our gondolier took us on a loop that involved some time on the Grand Canal, we also spent a decent amount of time navigating the small canals, often alone. The gondola provided an interesting perspective; a glimpse of a time past. Many years ago, the gondola was a primary form of travel to get around Venice, with numbers nearing 10,000 gondolas. Today, there are about 500 remaning, primarily to give tourists an experience. The vaporettos are now the common way to get around Venice.

After our gondola ride, we felt we had done most, if not everything, we had come to Venice for, so we set off on a stroll to take the long way back to the apartment we rented to warm up and decide where to have dinner.

with it being our last night, we knew we wanted to stay in Venice's culinary wheelhouse; more pizza and gelato. We found a highly rated pizza place, Da Mamo's, and wandered over. Thankfully, we got there as they were opening and before the rush. By the time we left, it was packed. The pizza was excellent. While I preferred the crust of another place a bit more, the sauce and cheese were better here. It was certainly a good pizza to end our time with.

After dinner, we tried two more gelato places in our quest to find the best. We believe we have it narrowed down to Amorino's for lemon, strawberry, and raspberry; Grom's for lemon and fruit di bosco, and Suso's for chocolate and fruit di bosco. Unfortunately, Amorino's was closed when we were walking back to the apartment to finish our comparison. Regardless, all three were delicious and highly recommend.

With an early morning looming, we packed our things and went to bed early.

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Vacate to Venice 2019 - Burano & Murano

We awoke to the sounds of birds, mainly seagulls, making noise outside our apartment. It was not overly different to the sounds we hear out of our actual flat in Bristol.

Following a quick shower, we were off to find the boat stop to buy our tickets and head off to Burano and Murano. Our walk took us over the Rialto Bridge, an ironic bridge in the heart of Venice. It is much quieter in the morning than when we arrived the night before. It is also nice to be able to see what is around us. Betting on finding food as we walked, we were on the lookout for a bakery. As luck would have it, we found one and snagged a couple croissants to take on our journey to the vaporetto.

We had to wait a little while before the vaporetto to Burano appeared. We climbed on, snagging a window seat for the 45 minute cruise to the island. As we were leaving Venice, we passed the Cimitero and several other small islands, making stops of Murano and Mazzorbo before reaching Burano.

Burano is a small fishing village island known for its colorful houses and fine lace. Fishermen, in an attempt to easily locate their homes when coming back from the sea, painted their houses in bright colors. Today, the tradition continues more to help continue bringing tourists than anything else. The village was beautiful and very colorful, a nice change from drab, stone, and brick. In addition to the colorful homes, the island is known for fine lace production. As we wandered around taking in the sights, we stopped in a few lace shops and galleries to see if Kari found any she was interested in. Unfortunately, her favorite places were around €800, which was a little more than we wanted to spend at this moment. They were super beautiful and soft, so I could not blame her for liking them.

As we set off on our day of adventure, we decided to treat it as a "State Fair" food day. For us, that means trying things whenever we find something that looks good and sharing it. Since we were in Italy, we found a nice pizza place and shared a salami pizza. Quite tasty.

After spending a couple hours on Burano, taking in the sights and eating some pizza, we headed off to the boat stop to catch the vaporetto back to Murano. As luck would have it, we arrived at the boat stop five minutes prior to departure and were able to jump on the boat. Similar to our cruise to Burano, we made a quick stop at Mazzorbo before heading to Murano.

Murano, while still beautiful, does not have the same level of charm as Burano with its colorful homes. Instead, Murano is known for its history as one of the premiere glass blowing places in the world. There are 47 families still operating today that have been blowing glass for generations. To learn more about this history, we went to the Murano Glass Museum, Museo del Vetro. It was fascinating to see how the master glass makers changed styles over the centuries, with some styles lost and rediscovered over time.

After our time in the museum, we set off to see if we could find a glass blower in action. Unfortunately, we were not so lucky. Instead, we found some authentic shops and learned more about specific glass makers while perusing for some glass to bring home. There are some truly incredible pieces available on the island.

With the sun going down, we thought it would be good to head back to Venice. On the walk back to the vaporetto, we stopped for our first gelato. I had strawberry and lemon, and Kari had raspberry and lemon. They were quite delicious. One of the other benefits of the sun going down was the lights strung across the smaller canals were lit. It added some romance and ambience to the already beautiful scene.

Back in Venice, we wandered back to our apartment with a stop at Captain Candy (danger!) and the Co-Op, a local grocery. We tried to warm up a bit before heading back out to catch a vaporetto the ride along the Grand Canal at night. Of course, we snagged another gelato for our walk to the vaporetto, because why not?

The Grand Canal at night is absolutely stunning. The restaurants, bridges, and homes are lit as people head out for an evening of fun memories. We tried to soak it all in as we meandered along the Grand Canal to Piazza San Marco. Similar to the Grand Canal's beauty at night, the Piazza San Marco was stunning. Kari was in awe of the size and grandeur of the place, particularly when compared against the other squares we had seen prior. The piazza shone from thousands of lights strung throughout. We took a stroll around the lights, while also looking for a place to have an authentic Italian meal. The place we ultimately chose was not far off the square. I had some good spaghetti and meatballs, while Kari had spaghetti and scampi. Unfortunately, hers was not as good as mine. We will have to find a better spot for her tomorrow.

After dinner, we walked back to our apartment. The city was starting to buzz and come to life. All of the small roads were packed with people as we could hear some bars starting to overflow into the streets. We crossed the Rialto Bridge one final time to get back to the side of the Grand Canal we were staying.

Before getting back, we stopped for one more gelato, our third of the day. Since it was our third, we opted to share a strawberry, raspberry, and lemon gelato. This was probably our favorite place we have tried thus far. Dangerous it is only a couple blocks from the apartment we are staying in.

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Vacate to Venice 2019 - Travel to Venice

While living abroad is its own adventure, we wanted to take advantage of our proximity to Europe to explore as much as possible. For our first weekend getaway since our move to Bristol, we picked Venice. We found some cheap, non-stop flights from Bristol to Venice, as well as some nice, affordable lodging in the heart of the city. What could be better?!

After a short half day of work, we took off to a bus stop to catch the Bristol Flyer. Normally, we took Uber to the airport (or drove) in the States, due to its convenience and ease. In Bristol, we do not have a car, so driving is out, which leaves our options as taxi/Uber, bus, or train. With the pervasiveness of public transport in the city, there is a dedicated bus line, the Bristol Flyer, that runs between Bristol and the Bristol Airport every 10 minutes during the day. As a bonus, it costs the same as one Uber ride for round trip fare for two people. We figured it was worth the attempt.

Thirty minutes later and we were at the airport. This was our first time at the Bristol Airport as passengers departing to another destination. It took us a little time to get our bearings, but we managed to get through security fairly quickly. In total, it took us a little over an hour from the time we left our flat until we were through security in the airport. Good to know for future trips.

Since we got to the airport really early and we had already eaten lunch, we explored some of the shops while waiting for our flights to be announced. In the future, grabbing food at the airport looks promising.

Our flight was pretty uneventful. We chose to fly EasyJet, a low-cost carrier in Europe. The service was fine, and everything costs an extra fee. The coolest part of the flight was seeing the mountains as we started our descent into Venice.

In Venice, we made it through customs and found a taxi service to take us to the Piazzale Roma. It as a quick trip, in part thanks to our driver's blatant disregard for the speed limit. Speed limit, more like speed suggestion. From the Piazzale Roma, we had a 20 minute walk to our meeting point for the apartment we rented. Thankfully, our UK sims worked here. Even though Google maps were not perfect, they were certainly helpful when navigating the narrow streets in the dark.

We met our host at the San Silvestro boat stop, which was a short walk from the apartment. He gave us a tour of the 2 bedroom/2 bath property we rented, how to operate the controls, and gave us some suggestions of things to do, see, and eat before leaving us for the night. Taking one of his recommendations, we dropped our bags and went to Birraria La Corte, which was a delicious pizza (and Italian food) place. I had a diavola (i.e., pepperoni) pizza, and Kari had a margherita (i.e., cheese) pizza. Super delicious!

Back at the apartment, we got settled and into bed to be rested for our adventures in the morning.

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Aloha Adventure 2017

It's always a stressful time of year, the holidays. Planning for time with family, buying gifts for reunion gift changes with people you have not seen in a year, resolving to finish all the "to dos" that you have put on the back burner so you can end the year cleanly and start fresh on January 1st. So what better time to escape all of that stress and go to Hawaii??

What's even better than a trip to Hawaii? A trip partially covered by my company!

Given the high-turnover common in travel positions like mine, my company added a reward trip for those who go on at least 75 work trips during the first few years. For the trip, I was allowed to pick somewhere I have never been in the US for a week, and I was allowed to bring Kari. One of the few places I've never been in the US is Hawaii. Once I qualified for the trip, Kari and I jumped to head on a week to Hawaii!

Since this was our first trip to Hawaii, we opted to spend a couple days on Kauai before heading over to Maui for four days. Kauai, also known as the Garden Isle and the oldest of the main Hawaiian Islands, is lush and a little more remote. Maui, also known as the Valley Isle, is home to Haleakala, Hana and its famous road, and beautiful coastlines. We love being outdoors and active, and we figured this was a good sampling of the Hawaiian Islands.

When you think tropical paradise, what do you equate with that? Palm trees, sandy beaches, lush foliage, etc. Regardless of what you thought, I highly doubt oodles of feral chickens are on your list. In the early 90s, a hurricane hit Kauai, releasing chickens that have become more wild over the years. We found them at breakfast, along the sides of the roads, in parking lots, and in stores. Everywhere we looked, we found more chickens. It became more of a game to see where we could find more chickens.

On Kauai, we stayed at the Koloa Landing Resort. With its location on the leeward side of the island near the water, we had a beautiful base camp for our adventures. Thankfully, we were upgraded to a two room suite with a small kitchen, washer, and dryer. Having the second room and patio provided the additional benefit of a space for me to go and read while I waited for Kari to wake up.

We started off our adventure on Kauai with surf lessons at Poipu Beach Surf School. Kari was a natural on the water. She did a great job popping up and riding the waves. The waves were borderline big enough for me to get up. I could see the benefit learning to surf as a kid. One of the two kids in our group was buoyant enough to ride waves that did not break. He was so little.

After we wrapped up surfing, we headed over to Waimea Canyon to explore and identify possible hiking routes. With daylight rapidly diminishing, we were not able to hike that day. As we drove into the state park, we stopped to take in the sites. At the end of the road, we found one of the wettest spots on Earth, Mount Waialeale. This shield volcano around 400 inches of rain per year. Holy cow!

Our second day was supposed to be our day to take our Jurassic Falls helicopter tour. Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperating. The helicopter company postponed our tour to the next day, hoping the weather would clear. This was the activity I was most excited for, so I was a little bummed we were not able to go. Not wanting to waste our day, we headed up to hike the Kalalau Trail along the Na Pali Coast.

Given all of the rain, the trail was muddy and slippery. We were really glad we had our trekking poles to maintain some level of balance. The other area where we found evidence of the rain and flooding was the Hanakapi`ai Stream. The "stream" was full and raging. We felt for the backpackers that needed to cross the stream to continue on to camp or get out. While we wanted to explore the other side, we chose the smarter option and turned back.

Along the trail, we found a helicopter landing pad. Naturally, Kari pretended to be a helicopter coming in for a landing! Enjoy the video!

On our final morning on Kauai, we checked out of our hotel and headed over for our helicopter tour. The day to find dinosaurs was upon us! Our helicopter tour started off skirting coast before heading in to snake through the canyons. As we approached the waterfall, the same one that they landed at in Jurassic Park, our pilot turned on the Jurassic Park theme music. Super cool!

Following a quick pit-stop searching for dinosaurs at the base of the waterfall, we jumped back into the helicopter to continue our tour. Our pilot took us to the heart of the island to see where it was born. While in flight, we saw more effects of the recent rains. There were numerous waterfalls all over the island! This helicopter tour was certainly the highlight of the trip thus far!

With a little time before we needed to catch our flight, we headed over to the Kilohana to explore and ride the Kauai Plantation Railway. It was a fun end to our short time on the island. Despite that, we knew we wanted to come back and spend more time here.

One of the smarter decisions I made was to get us first class tickets on our flight from Kauai to Maui. It was only a little more than the cost of a coach seat plus the baggage fee plus it was way more comfortable!

After the short hop from Kauai to Maui, we grabbed our jeep and headed to the Old Lahaina Luau. Our first luau in Hawaii was pretty fun. We tried hula and watched as they pulled the pig from the imu. The meal was delicious. Since it was all you could eat and drink, we made sure to fill up before heading off to our hotel, the Wailea Beach Resort, for the night. The parting gift was a delicious piece of banana bread, probably the best banana bread we had on the trip.

Our second day on Maui started with the Molokini and Turtle Town Snorkel Tour. The ride out to Molokini Crater was beautiful. We connected with a couple we had met the previous night at the luau and snorkeled with some amazing fish and coral. After we had our fill at the crater, we headed over to Turtle Town. We were pleasantly surprised to learn that Turtle Town was a short walk from our hotel. We quickly swam over to where the crew mentioned to look for turtles, and we found a few green sea turtles playing in the waves by the shore. Soon, it was time to head back and continue our adventure on land.

One the places we had heard so much about was Sarento's On The Beach. We managed to secure a table on the water for sunset. Not only was the food delicious, but watching the sunset was even more special.

For our first day off on the island, we decided to drive up Haleakala to hike in the crater. Since we did not plan ahead to secure a sunrise slot before arriving on the island, we were not able to go about our day completely as planned. Thankfully, we secured a slot for the following morning. Our hike in the crater was like we were hiking on Mars through a dense fog. Other than a few small scrub bushes, what we could see of the landscape was seemingly devoid of all life. Occasionally, we found cinder cones amongst the landscape.

Before we headed down, we saw a few cyclists starting to crest the summit. It was super cute watching a couple make it to the top and celebrate before starting the descent back down. Most people opt to be driven to the top to ride down; however, a few choose to ride both ways. Hopefully, I can convince Kari that this would be super fun some day!

The time had arrived for us to wake up really, really early and begin our drive up Haleakala to watch the sunrise. We managed to get to the top at about 5:30am, which was about an hour before sunrise. After going to the rest room, we bundled up and searched for a good spot to take in the view. Instead of staying with the rest of the folks watching the sunrise, we hiked back towards the trail leading into the crater to have a little solitude. It was a magical experience.

Unlike the day before when we had time to hang out at the top before we needed to leave, we needed to scurry down shortly after sunrise to catch our whale watching ferry tour. Even though it was the beginning of the whale watching season, we figured we would try. It was a beautiful ride towards Lanai. We saw a rainbow in a valley and flashes of a whale before jumping in for a quick snorkel.

On our last day on Maui, we spent the day on the famous Hana Highway. With all of the options to journey along the road, we struggled to figure out the best way to do it. We knew we did not want to go with a private tour company, so we could go at our own pace. Thankfully, we were recommended to check out Shaka Guide by a couple we met during the whale watching tour. It was fantastic! We climbed through a lava tube to a secret world, hiked to a hidden waterfall, explored black and red sand beaches, and ate loads of banana bread. It was a perfect end to a great trip!

Following our adventurous day on the Road to Hana, we made our way back to the airport to begin our long journey home. This trip was a great sampling of Hawaii and left us eager to come back!

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