Italy, Day 1: Travel, Milan

I decided to try blogging about my trip as a way to document it for myself before I forget the little details, and also a (hopefully) entertaining way to share my photos with anyone who'd like to see what we were up to!

We flew out on May 1 -- scheduled for a 6:30AM flight. The night before was crazy with horrible tornadoes and torrential rain. I packed while keeping one eye on the weather updates, and decided I'd skip a last minute trip to Walgreens -- they sell shampoo in Italy! I spent the night with my daughter and her husband so they could drop me off at the airport bright and early Saturday morning (4:30AM). It was a pretty sleepless night, and we had a few delays leaving Little Rock but finally were in the air around 8:30AM. I'll skip the details of the flights, but really everything went well. The longest bit from NY to Milan was 8 1/2 hours in the air and I slept as much as possible.

It was 8:30AM Europe time, May 2nd, when we arrived in Milan. We took a shuttle to the train station to stow our bags so we could explore a little before heading to Venice.

Jetlag anyone?

Milan's train station.

Then lunch (Penne al Pesto) and people watching.


Then off to check out the beautiful Duomo.

For €5 we climbed about 47 landings of 3-5 steps each (around and around).

Views from the top:

After a couple of hours we headed back to the station for a 3PM train to Venice. The trip was about 3 hours, and I was really trying to stay awake but I just couldn't. We had some drama in Venice when we all attempted to get off the train but only two of us made it! Turns out we were supposed to get off at the next stop anyway. Jennifer and I managed to get on the next train going that direction, and it all worked out. We found the water taxi and took the 35 minute ride to Hotel Riviera in Lido, an island just across from Venice. We had dinner at La Pizzeria Stella, then finally SLEEP.

Lessons learned:

You MUST have some form of communication within the group -- Jennifer and Rich had cellphones but I thought I could rely on wi-fi with my IPod Touch -- no wi-fi in the train station. Our little train separation would have been much worse if they hadn't been able to call and figure out where we were supposed to be. This turned out to be a problem for me again later in the trip.

Also, this is when I lost my Kindle. I had it out on the train to Venice and I THINK I put it in my bag before Jennifer and I got off the train (the first time), but then I left that bag behind when we made it to the real stop. Although I was able to run back and find my bag, the Kindle was gone. Did I leave it on the train or did someone take it from the bag? Can't be careful enough with your stuff. I blame the jet lag. When we checked back a couple of days later when we were leaving Venice I was told, "No lost office!" Note to TrenItalia, you need a lost office!

Tomorrow -- Venice!