Italy (final- part 4): Venice
We arrived in Venice in the late afternoon. The city is surrounded by water, so the only way to get around is to either walk or take a boat. There are public transportation boats, and we took one from where we parked the cars to our hotel. There were some amazing sights on the way!
After settling into our (tiny!!) hotel room, we met up and ate dinner. Kayla had been cooped up in the car for most of the day and was ready to run. David let her run around by the water (which made me EXTREMELY nervous.... the water made the ground very slippery and it would have been easy for her to fall into the yucky water, not to mention that it was deep water. David did not seem too concerned. She did not fall in, however, and she was having a blast!). As soon as our food came we enjoyed dinner right on the water!
After dinner we walked to St. Mark's Square. This was one of my favorite things in Venice. At night time all of the restaurants have musicians playing outside and Kayla loved to dance (read: run in circles) to the music. The lighting was pretty terrible to take pictures, but you can get the idea!
The next day began at our own pace. We went back to St. Mark's Square to see it in the day time.
Then we headed to the famous Rialto Bridge. It's a beautiful bridge and has a beautiful view of the city along the water. There are also tons of shops on the bridge, although Kayla was not in a mood to let us go shopping! :) We went and found like a farmer's market area, where they were selling fresh fruits, veggies and seafood. Kayla saw blackberries and raspberries and we bought multiple containers and she ate it all up! She didn't get a whole lot of fresh fruit on this trip, and she was so excited to have some!
At 1pm we met up with the Taylor's, and they offered to take Kayla for a few hours. This was really the first time we'd been without Kayla the whole trip and we were excited to get some alone time! We decided to do some walking and get out seeing as much of Venice as we could (without having to carry a stroller up and down stairs every 2 minutes!).
We walked all the way to the end point of one part of Venice and we sat down on the edge and put our feet over the side where the waves would splash water on them. We sat for a long time, just taking in the beauty of the city and enjoying silence as well as some conversation. This was actually one of the highlights of the trip for me. I really enjoyed the peacefulness of it (in part because we didn't have Kayla with us, and in part because of the beauty).
We also ate lunch as just the two of us and it was so relaxing. It was so nice to not be concerned about anyone but ourselves and take our time and enjoy the food. And you better believe we enjoyed every last drop of the 6 Euro each sodas we bought! Drinks were quiet expensive here... but so worth it!
At 5 we were meeting back up with the Taylor's at the Jewish Ghetto area of Venice. While there Kayla made some friends and the mother of the kids gave Kayla one of the beach balls that they had. She LOVED it and enjoyed running around and kicking and throwing it!
We met back up in one of the hotel suites and had some cheese and wine and chatted. Then David, Kayla and I headed out again to eat a small dinner and take some last looks at Venice. We also found some live bands and Kayla enjoyed dancing with me!
The next morning we got up early and took a boat to our car and began the 6-7 hour drive back to Rome. Linda left Venice by train to visit family instead of heading back to Rome with us. She was such an awesome tour guide and we are so thankful for everything she did to make the trip so enjoyable for us.
Kayla did pretty well in the car, considering the length of the drive. She was happy to be out of the car seat and able to run around our hotel back in Rome. We packed everything up and had time to take Kayla out to the garden area/lawn at the hotel and just run around! Then we all went out to dinner at a yummy pizzeria and then we got some delicious dessert treats to take home!
The next day began our extremely long trip home. There was the 11 hour plane ride, the 5 hour layover in Atlanta, and then our delayed flight into GR. We left the hotel about 7am and didn't get into our house in GR until about 11:30pm.... so considering the 6 hour time difference, that's about 23 hours of travel - yikes! The plane ride wasn't too bad. Kayla feel asleep during dinner... we had just got our dinner trays (did I mention how tough it is to eat dinner with a child on your lap and a tray that flips easily if that child decides she's unhappy about something) and she was eating a cracker and she laid down on my lap, and honestly just closed her eyes and fell asleep! She is not the type of kid to ever do this (she's never fallen asleep in her high chair or anything close to that) but the intensity of the day and the long days/short nights on the trip really just knocked her out! And after she woke up, different family members took her for a little bit here and there, so the 11 hours wasn't too bad. And the layover wasn't terrible either. But once our flight got delayed she was SO exhausted and was just screaming so David took her for a walk in the Ergo and she eventually fell asleep. She didn't really wake up until the next morning, despite all of the transfers.
Overall we had an unbelievable, once-in-a-lifetime trip. It was exhausting, we knew it would be. It would have been exhausting without a toddler, but that part added in even more exhaustion and a bit of stress. In some ways it would have been nice to leave her in the states. We probably would have enjoyed Italy more. However, we wouldn't have enjoyed OUR family in Italy. She is such a part of our lives, and even the extra stress she added was worth it to see the joy she experienced. Plus I've never spent a night away from her, so the thought of spending more than a week away is a bit daunting. So... in the end we are glad we took her (plus I think the Taylor's would have been sad to not get to see her). The memories of this trip will last forever. I think I said this before, but we said before we bought plane tickets that we knew we'd regret it if we didn't go. We just hoped that we didn't decide to go and then regret it. And we don't regret it, not one single bit!