On the Road Again

Well, in the air again anyway.  Coincidently exactly two years since we were last in Venice we're back, this time for a couple of weeks.  We are in an apartment with the view above, large, well located, convenient to pretty much anything, with one drawback that had never occurred to me: that pretty canal is sort of a major thoroughfare for motorized boat traffic and the bridge on the right leads to the huge Campo Santa Margherita, favorite hangout for the students of the Ca' Foscari University.  Especially on Saturday night.

So, let's talk about jet lag.  It's hell.  I know some people say they simply get over it, wake at 8:00 in the morning and hit the sights.  I think they're lying.  I'm lying too, in bed, sleepless until the time my body thinks is night.  In California.

One of the great advantages to staying in an apartment is you can have breakfast at noon (on your beautiful terrace.  Did I mention the beautiful terrace?) and not venture out until afternoon and no one looks askance at you for being such a lazy twit.  So that's what we did yesterday.

I've never had an activity app on my phone on previous visits but I now have evidence that a stroll around the narrow streets and over the bridges in your path during a typical "where the hell are we?" outing in Venice will cover about four miles a day.  With breaks for coffee, spritz, lunch, chats with darling old men standing in the doorway of 16th century palazzi, etc.  

I've been using my Italian as much as I can, trying not to let the Venetians, who mostly speak better English than I do, divert the conversation to make it easier on their ear.  I was particularly proud to understand a few sentences spoken to each other by people passing in the street.  Of course I find myself going blank often enough when trying to remember a word, and yesterday I wound up in a conversation in French because that's what came out of my mouth in spite of myself.  Well I assume it will get better.

Since we are awake and fed and dressed I think we'll get moving before we remember it's the middle of the night in California.  More later. A presto.