Venice- DAY ONE

September 6, 2013

Venice DAY ONE

The first day was a long one! Awoken by the alarm at 3:15am I rolled into the shower and got ready for the upcoming adventure. The Taxi arrived at the Manchester Airport Premiere inn at 4:15am. Once arrived at the terminal, the realization that we were about to go on a trip we had saved and planned for months was about to become real.

Arrival

My boyfriend and I decided to go with Easy Jet, cheap and cheerful! Our flight was at 7am (GMT) which got us in at 11am (One hour ahead of the UK) giving us a whole day in Venice. Once arriving at Venice airport all we knew is we had to find the boat ticket machine. The machine looks very confusing and is located in the baggage collection hall. I would suggest using Alilaguna BLUE line as it is the only boat company which provides a service to and from the airport. If requesting a ticket from a ticket office, specify that you want the Alilaguna BLUE as they will presume that you want a boat to the bus station where you will then have to find a bus going to the airport. We decided to use Alilaguna for ease. The airport ticket machine does offer a return ticket (15 euros one way ticket or 30 euros return) but we were unsure of how long the return was valid for.

Hotel

Looking at the reviews we thought it would be a game of hide and seek to find our hotel, surprisingly it was incredibly easy. We jumped off the boat at the St Mark’s Square stop and walked along the harbor where there were brilliant paintings being sold. We then went into St Marks Square where we (Skilfully) winded our suitcases In and out of the thousands of tourists taking snaps of the surroundings. The hotel was the second alley way to the side of Basilica di San Marco. We were welcomed by an extremely friendly receptionist, Rocco. Humorous and very helpful. We were then led back onto the street and walked round a corner which was about 30 seconds away from the reception. The door blended into the building and we knew ahead of us were thousands of steps to take up to the room. The room was lovely. Styled in a classic Venetian theme. We stayed at Relais Piazza San Marco, here’s the link to the website gallery (we stayed in the second room photo) http://www.relaisanmarcovenice.com/relais-san-marco-2/gallery.php . I would HIGHLY recommend this hotel. Location is perfect as it’s a 30 second walk from St Marc’s square. (I would suggest taking a look on Booking.com for cheeper prices and book it early for the best price!)

Food

We arrived at Venice just in time for lunch. Although by this time we had been on the move for 9 hours; running off just a couple of Burger King chilly cheese bites and we were HUNGRY. We weren’t too fussy about where we got our food from, we would have eaten anything by this point. Fortunately there was a corner sandwich bar practically on our door stop. It was getting a lot of attention so we decided to grab some grub. I went for a toasted sandwich the same size as my face! We were surprised at how cheap food was in Venice. Lunch only costing us 5 Euros a day. For our night time meal we went straight to Hard Rock to complete our mission of visiting every Restaurant of the kind. Prices were standard Hard Rock Café prices, which we were best pleased about.

Entertainment

During our first day we decided to get the grips with the area. We took endless pictures of the cute streets and adorable canals. It’s practically impossible to get bored in Venice. The first thing we set out to go and see was the Rialto Bridge which was incredibly well sign posted. The view from the top is amazing. It’s a MUST see for anyone visiting Venice.

Here are a few snapshots of our first day…