D15: Conquering Venice
We absolutely conquered Venice today. The first morning spot for coffee ruined me forever. On a whim, I ordered a few pastries at the bakery in addition to our espresso and wow, that pastry was life changing. Even just writing this, my mouth is watering at the thought of the pastry (don't ask me what pastry it was… it was magical and that all that matters). We followed this up by walking to a breakfast spot where we ordered three different types of croissant and this tasty nutella waffle where we ate them at a standing counter like a typical Venetian.
Next, you might guess what we did - went to another café, this one the infamous Café Florian located in St. Marks Square and is the most plush coffee shop I've ever been. It was fit for a king and after all of that caffeine, I felt like one.
We'd scheduled a tour of the Doges Palace, which was the residence of the elected leader of the Venetian City-State kingdom and spent the next few hours learning about the history of the place. The palace was built to showcase the wealth and power of the empire, and I'd say they did a pretty good job it. My favorite fact I learned during the tour of the palace is that it included the largest room in Europe that is built without columns. The massive roof is structurally supported by essentially an upside hull of a boat, which could only be built by the city's master boat builders (and considering the city was built on water… there are some damn good boat builders there).
After Doge's Palace, we strolled the city stopping at the famous Rialto Bridge that spans the Grand Canal and is lined with shops and went on a gondola ride in the canals of Venice. The gondola ride was an incredible, incredible experience and is something I'll never forget. Our gondolier (I googled it, it is a real word) did a mix of using the oar and kicking off the walls of the city to propel us through the water.
I'd heard the sunset from the rooftop of the Hilton on an island just a short ferry across the lagoon was spectacular so we went there but didn't have any luck since it was booked for the night. We headed back to the main island and ended up landing a beautiful spot to enjoy a cocktail and sunset on a restaurant barge docked against the island.
We nailed most of the "must-dos" of Venice in one day -- quite the adventure!