(Italy Flag)


(Italy Map)

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2009:

Very early Wednesday morning we docked in Venice Italy.
This was the end of my cruise on the Royal Princess.
I spent two nights at the Hotel Monaco & Grand Canal Venice.


With my umbrella in hand,
I began exploring Venice after getting settled at the hotel.

My first day in Venice was a rainy one as you can see in the eleven minute video below.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2009:

All of the images below are thumbnails and can be clicked on for a larger image.

Thursday was a much better day weather wise.
It started off a little cloudy but improved as the day went on.
About a ten minute walk from my hotel is Rialto.
Rialto is an area of the San Polo sestiere of Venice known for its markets and for the Rialto Bridge.
The Rialto Bridge is one of the four bridges spanning the Grand Canal in Venice.
It is the oldest bridge across the canal.
The stone bridge, a single span designed by Antonio da Ponte, was completed in 1591.


There is a fantastic view of the Grand Canal from the Rialto Bridge.
The Grand Canal forms one of the major water-traffic corridors in the city.
Public transport is provided by water buses and private water taxis, but many tourists visit it by gondola.
The Grand Canal banks are lined with more than 170 beautiful buildings,
most of which date back to the 13th through the 18th century.

In the eleven minute video below marvel at the Rialto Bridge and the Grand Canal of Venice.

There is pretty much a canal around every corner as you walk through Venice.


At first it can be quite perplexing trying to get from point A to point B on the narrow winding streets of Venice.
But it was also quite fun, like trying to find your way through a maze.


Campo Di S.S. Giovanni and The church of San Zanipolo was a very beautiful spot in the center of the city.
The Bridge of Sighs is an enclosed bridge made of white limestone and has windows with stone bars.
It passes over the Rio di Palazzo and connects the old prisons to the interrogation rooms in the Doge's Palace.
Unfortunately the surrounding buildings were covered in ugly scaffolding during my visit.


The waterfront by the Venetian Lagoon is a very busy area with great views of San Giorgio Maggiore Island.


The Doge's Palace was the residence of the Doge of Venice. It was largely constructed from 1309 to 1424.


St. Mark's Basilica is the seat of the Patriarch of Venice,
archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Venice.


Piazza San Marco (known in English as St. Mark's Square), is the principal square of Venice, Italy.
A remark often attributed to Napoleon calls the Piazza San Marco "The drawing room of Europe".
It is one of the few great urban spaces in a Europe where human voices prevail over
the sounds of motorized traffic, which is confined to Venice's waterways.
As the central landmark and gathering place for Venice,
Piazza San Marco is extremely popular with tourists, photographers, and Venetian pigeons.


St Mark's Campanile is the bell tower of St. Mark's Basilica.
The tower is 323 feet tall, and stands alone in a corner of St. Mark's Square, near the front of the basilica.
The view from the top of the campanile is nothing short of spectacular!


The Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute is a minor basilica church in Venice, located at a
narrow finger of land which lies between the Grand Canal and the Bacino di San Marco on the lagoon.
San Giorgio Maggiore is one of the islands of Venice.
Best known for the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore, designed by Palladio and begun in 1566.


If you look closely, in some of the pictures you can see snow-capped mountains behind the city.


The Venetian Lagoon is the enclosed bay of the Adriatic Sea in which the city of Venice is situated.

In the eleven minute video below you hear the bells ring out across St. Mark's Square, see the Doge's Palace and St. Mark's Basilica and be awe struck from the view at the top of the campanile.

At sunset I took an hour long cruise through the canals of Venice.


It was a very nice cruise ending back where we started at St. Mark's Square.

Watch the eleven minute video below to see my boat ride through the canals of Venice.

The sun setting on Venice was a nice ending to
my fantastic 37-day journey around the world.

In the eleven minute video below see the clips of Venice that would not fit in the videos above.

Watch the sixty minute video below to see my entire day in Venice.

I returned to Venice in 2013. Click HERE for the details.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2009:

I had to wake up early on Friday to begin the long journey home.
On the first leg of the trip I flew from Venice, Italy to Frankfurt, Germany.
It was a short flight of about one hour on a Lufthansa A321 leaving at 7:00AM.

After two hours in Frankfurt it was a nine hour flight to Chicago's O'Hare on a Lufthansa A340-600.

I arrived in Chicago at 1:10PM local time.
I had to wait a long six hours before the final leg of the trip on an
American Airlines commuter jet to Indianapolis which arrived in Indianpolis at 9:05PM.

MY EMAIL SENT ON NOVEMBER 7, 2009

Hello Everyone, This is my final report from my trip. Sadly my vacation is over and I have safely made it all the way around the world and am now back home. Yesterday was a very long day. I spent 25 hours either in the air or in airports. Had to wake up at 3:00am Italy time, which was 9:00pm Thursday night Indiana time and did not get home until 10:00 Friday night. I flew out of Venice. Not a very big airport and the line to check-in was huge, it wrapped all around the small terminal. You couldn't tell where the line began and ended. I started waiting in line only to realize there was still more line elsewhere and had to move and start waiting again. By the time I got checked in the plane was boarding. Flew to Frankfurt, Germany. Only had a couple hours there before flying to Chicago's Ohare. Had over six hours to wait there before the final flight to Indy. Spent the final two days of the trip in Venice, Italy. The first day was awful, it rained all day. But the second day was very nice. It started off a little cloudy but as the day went on it got better and better. I spent both days walking all around this beautiful city. Got wet the first day. My hotel was one block from St. Mark's Square. Nice hotel but very small room. My room on the ship was bigger. Below is St. Mark's Square. The square was completely flooded and under water on Wednesday and it was mid-day Thursday before it was dried out. Below is a closer look at St. Mark's Basilica. I went to the top of the bell tower or Campanile for great views of Venice. The picture below looks down on St. Mark's Square. From the top you can't even see all the canals running between all the buildings. In the picture below you can see the snowcapped mountains behind the city. In the picture below you can see San Giorgio Maggiore and the building on the lower left is the Doge's Palace. In the panorama below you can see the domes of St. Mark's Basilica. They ring the bells quite frequently which are directly above your head when you are up there. I don't know if they clear out the top every hour or they ring them with people up there. In the center of Venice along the Grand Canal it the Rialto Bridge. The pictures below were taken from the Rialto Bridge. Below is the view from the other side of the bridge. It was fun walking the narrow streets of the city. It is very easy to get lost. No street goes straight for more than a few feet. But getting lost was fun, it was like finding your way out of a maze. There are hundreds of bridges and a canal around every corner. Lots of beautiful churches in Venice. Below is the Santi Giovanni e Paacuteolo church and statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni. Just before sunset I took an hour long cruise all around the city. The picture below is on the Grand Canal shortly after passing under the Rialto Bridge. Venice was a nice end to a fantastic trip. I visited 14 countries not counting Croatia which I only got a small glance of. And did indeed circle the globe. It was interesting visiting a different culture almost everyday. It's probably going to be a while before I take another big trip so this one will have to last me a while. Had I known the economy was going to completely tank when I started planning this trip two years ago, I probably would have never taken this one. When I left home the leaves hadn't even started falling and now they are almost completely gone. I missed all of my favorite season. Happy Thanksgiving everybody! Tim

Click on email photos for the large full-size photograph.

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