Volleyball wed nite

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Here I Go Again...

...not keeping up with the blog after we get home.

Last day was in Venice, again. Got delayed at the airport from Berlin. The aircraft was late arriving from London...I guess there was a nasty storm in the U.K. that caused an hour and a half delay.

Arrived in Venice, took the bus from the airport to the city and rode the vaporetto to our hotel. We stayed at a different hotel than last week. This one was very close to the vaporetto stop on the Grand Canal. Outstanding location and internet access (free for the first 30 minutes, €20 for 5 hours.)

Rode the vaporetto line 2, not as many stops, to a stop about halfway to St. Mark's Square. We walked and shopped looking for Carnivale masks. Heather found a cool one of the hypocritical plague doctor (the one with the big, long nose) at a shop that made masks for the Tom Cruise/Nicole Kidman move "Eyes Wide Shut." Never saw the movie.

Headed to St. Mark's Square and checked on Hard Rock Cafe but it still wasn't open. Kept walking looking for a mask for me. Found one near the hotel. It's a Casanova mask (big, black hat and pointy chin.) They're expensive.

Stopped at a pizzeria and got two pizza (they're small.) Grabbed a bottle of wine, some parmesan cheese and a couple pieces of bread from a shop near the hotel. Took it all back to the hotel and had a picnic in our room while watching a movie on the iPod.

Our flight the next morning was uneventful. Stopped and collected some water from the Grand Canal for our "dirt collection." Trisha picked us up from the airport (I re-payed here and the girls the next morning at 6:45 am) and we went to get the boys from Erin's house.

Bud

Why does the Superbowl start so late?

No way were we staying up until midnight thirty to watch the game kick off. But, there are quite a few bars here showing the Superbowl.

Sunday we went to the Reichstag, the German capital building, and walked along the large glass dome on top. Kind of a neat design - the people walk along the top and look down on the government and the politicians look up and see who they work for - the people.

Met a couple of Australian women who were on our Third Reich Tour. They were flying back to London in the evening. We gave them a hard time because they suggested the pub crawl the other night.

Lunch at ARoma, a coffee/sandwich joint with really good bacon, egg salad and tomato sandwiches. Free wi-fi, too, which has proven difficult to find here in the city.

On to Checkpoint Charlie and the Topography of Terror. Two cold-war Berlin wall attractions that are fun to see. The best part was the photo displays along the street with photos from before and after the wall fell. There's a double-coblestone path through the entire city that marks the location of where the wall once stood.

Went looking for a bookstore afterwards. It was more of a souvenir shop than book store. It's called Berlin Story and is on Unter den Linden street near the Brandenburg Gate. We went to Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts for a snack.

Did some more walking and shopping. Then took bus #100 to Potsdamer Platz. The bus route passes many of the sights in Berlin. Did more walking and shopping and ended up at Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. In our defense, we do live in Italy and our Applebees closed down, so there's nowhere back "home" to get American food. We split the nachos and Twisted Mac & Cheese.

Back to the hotel around 9:30 - it's just too cold out for anything else.

Bud

Saturday...Still in Berlin

Started at Pariser Platz again for the Third Reich Tour. The photo above is the famous hotel where Michael Jackson dangled his baby from the balcony for the press. (That wasn't part of the Third Reich Tour...that's left over from yesterday's tour.)

This tour was a little more in depth about the Nazi party than the free tour yesterday. Worth the €12 each. Our guide was knowledgeable but he walked to fast. Those of us with short legs ended up holding the group back by 30 seconds or so every time we stopped!

Had lunch at a Doner Kebab. Decent food. Didn't know I liked lamb.

After the tour we wandered around the shopping district near the Zoo. Not an animal zoo, but a part of town in West Berlin. We priced tickets to take a day trip to Poland, but it's more than we wanted to spend. €40 and 4 hours each way on the train. We could go to Prague for that.

Had dinner and a Guinness at an Irish Pub., then met the evening tour for the Pub Crawl. We must be getting old because we got our money back at the first bar. The place was so packed with drunk college students that we could barely move. I've been to crowded bars before, but this was just stupid. All Heather could think about was the fire code!

We're back, safe and sound at the hotel. Nick called while Heather was in the shower. Not sure what he's doing up so late...but that's ok. I'm glad he called. I tried to call them earlier today and couldn't get through.

Bud

Berlin, Friday night

Out of the room around 1030 today after chatting with Trisha and the boys on Facebook. We are on vacation. Had a cappuccino and a bagel with cold scrambled eggs on top for breakfast. We won't be going there tomorrow. Price was right, though. €5 for both of us vs. €18 at the hotel.

It's snowing, very lightly, but it's wicked cold.

Went searching for the U.S. Embassy. Finally found it at Parisan Platz near the Brandenburg gate. No consular services there...that's at the south end of the city. We've never been to an embassy and have read in guide books that it's not a bad idea to register if you're going to be in town more than a few days. We just wanted to check it out.

So, like any American tourist in Berlin would do, we went to Starbucks. Mostly to use the rest room. And that's where the free tour meets - so it was easily justifiable.

We're big fans of the Sandemans free tours. This one didn't disappoint. Lots of Berlin history. Started at Brandenburg gate, went by the Berlin Wall as well as several old buildings and the spot where Hitler's bunker (the one he ended his life in at the end of the war) used to be. One of the buildings was the Berlin parliament, with the new glass dome. We learned it was exactly 76 years ago, on Jan 30, 1933, that Hitler was elected chancellor and started his campaign.

4 hours later, we're frozen solid. We got on a bus to the metro and took the underground to Potsdamer Platz.

The Sony Center is just a block away. It's a large entertainment/shopping center. There's an IMAX theater and a couple of restaurants that are listed in the Rick Steves guide. We ate at the Lindenbrauhaus, a restaurant spin off the beer halls of Munich. The food was very good. Who knew we liked sauerkraut?

Got back to the hotel around 9:00 pm.

Where do you go for vacation for 5 days in the dead of winter?

Why,
Berlin, of course! It's flippin' freezing cold here! The weather was gorgeous in Venice when we left this morning. I'm only now beginning to thaw out after the walk and metro ride back to the hotel after dinner tonight. Our day went something like this:

Breakfast at the hotel in Venice was good. Eggs, yogurt, bread, cheese, ham. Walked from the hotel to the Piazzale Roma - large bus lot in the north end of the city - to take the bus back to the airport. Only got turned around once, but it worked out because we got to see this huge boat-crane-barge-thing dredging the canal.

Had lunch at the airport before the flight...caprese and tortillini with a glass of merlot.

Plane ride was uneventful...smooth landing in Berlin. The control tower has anti-smash lights all over the top. I could see at least four from the plane. I've never seen a tower with anti-smash. I imagine that must get annoying if you're a controller there.

Stepped off the plane and almost got back on. It's very cold. The trees are frozen and white. There's a patch of snow here and there left over from last week.

Took the train to the city and then the metro to the wrong part of town. Asked a local for directions and got pointed in the right way. Got to the hotel, dropped off the bags and headed out for dinner.

We went to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. I know it sounds silly, but it's impossible to get a good cheeseburger at a restaraunt in Sicily. It was even colder when we left and headed back to the hotel. We're both tired from the day so we decided to call it an early night.

But here I am blogging away at 11:00 pm. I've been trying to access email all night but can't seem to read anything on yahoo. I think I sent an email earlier tonight (hello Trisha who's watching the boys for us back in Sicily) but I'm not sure.

Facebook is probably a good way to get ahold of us if anyone really needs to - but we'll probably only check once every day or two. We may start uploading photos on facebook since this blog seems to freeze up if I try to upload more than two or three pictures.

We miss the boys but are having a good time nevertheless.

I think we'll take a couple of walking tours tomorrow.

I can say goodbye in German but I don't know how it's spelled, so ciao,

Bud

Venice (Yesterday)

A lawn mover shop would do miserably in this city! No dirt or grass anywhere. A mecca for doorbell ditchers everywhere and lots of small stray dogs. We only saw one cat...and it had a collar so it wasn't a stray.

(Was proof-reading and that opening paragraph sounded kind of negative. It's not meant to...just observations. Venice is a beautiful, charming town that I'm blessed to get to visit but don't have to live in.)

Flew from Catania to Venice. Arrived at the Marco Polo Airport around 3:00 pm and rode the Venzia Express bus into Venice (only €3 each). Walked to the boat and bought a one-way ticket down the Grand Canal. Got off at the third stop and wandered around for about half an hour looking for our hotel. Difficult to find, but it's really a nice place and we didn't have trouble finding it once we knew right where it was!

Rushed back to the canal and hopped back on Line 1. The boat goes all the way from the main train station to St. Mark's Square. We did the Rick Steves Grand Canal Cruise of Venice. Downloaded the mp3 off his website and followed along with the guide book. The Rick Steves tours are pretty good and his guide books are invaluable.

At St. Marks Square we did a couple tracks of the audio tour and then headed out to find the Hard Rock Cafe. The store is open but the restaraunt is still closed. They won't open for food service for a couple weeks. We bought two new pins.

Started wandering back towards the hotel while looking in the shops. Carnivale is in a few weeks and the stores are stocked with masks. Saw a few we may pick up when we go back next week.

Stopped at a trattoria for dinner - good food and low priced. Don't remember the name.

The whole town looks mucher bigger on the map that it really is. It's deciving to look at a map of the city and see how far you need to walk - but it only turns out to be about 30 minutes.

The hotel was very nice and we would recommend it. Good breakfast and sattelite TV - not that we were in the room long enough to watch much TV. No internet, though. It's in the old Jewish quarter called the Ghetto. Nice ghetto. It's in a residential area so it's kind of neat to see all the homes and locals walking around.

Ciao,
Bud