Friday August 15th
We woke up in Vernazza, nice and late at 9 am. This lazy beach town feels good! Our room was super dark and I was tired. We had to be out of our room by ten, luckily with just backpacks we don't have much and we've gotten good at packing up quick!
We grabbed breakfast at a little fruit market, notable because I had the juiciest nectarine of my life! I bit into it and juice gushed out all over my arm, seriously gushed is the right word! I was so sticky! But it was one of the tastiest nectarines ever!
We jumped on the train headed back for La Spezia.
First I had to use a bathroom like this...welcome to squatters land! 
Heading to La Spezia we had extra time so we got off in the last of the Cinque Terre villages that we hadn't seen yet; Riomaggiore. It was absolutely charming!
I loved that you could get more of a view of the other villages from here. You have to look close to see, but they're there. Sorry for the low quality!
The village was small and just went straight up!
We were only there about 5 minutes before we ran to catch the train but we really liked this one!
Plus this guy was using the longest fishing pole I've ever seen! Hard to see, but oh well:
Cinque Terre in general was just awesome. Our first trip to the Mediterranean and we loved it! We are so glad that we took a couple of days and put this on our itinerary. It's been wonderful!
In the tunnel from the Riomaggiore station there was a girl playing the flute, she would play the melody and had a minus track for background. She was really good! Mostly we had such a good time trying to step/dance to the music. Russ would do the baseline and I would dance around (I'm no dancer p.s.) but we had a great time. Haha we especially laughed once she was playing the most famous song from "Carmen". We must have looked ridiculous, but it was so fun!
When we got off our train coming into La Spezia it would turn around and take another load to Cinque Terre...so
World war Z was on again! I couldn't help but laugh looking out the window of the door as we waited for the doors to open...a crowd of people looking anxious and antsy to get on. "This is the last helicopter out of Vietnam!!" Seriously we had to fight our way just to get off!
In La Spezia we had about an hour and a half until our train left for Venice. So we decided to walk down by the bridge and pier where we had been a few nights before. It was so fun to see that harbor and those boats in daylight!
There are quite a few well used fishing boats, this fisherman was fixing his nets:
I tried to catch the feeling of the marina in these pictures. It's like this cove surrounded by gorgeous green mountains that have scattered little neighborhoods on them. It was awesome!
Then we got to those giant yahts!
No surprise what kind of cars are parked in front of them eh?
Just a Ferrari and Rolls Royce...no big deal when you've got a multimillion dollar Yaht!
Seriously these were SO big!
The harbor is also connected to a naval base in La Spezia, so there is a big battleship there as well.
The bridge was also cool in day light.
La Spezia was a neat city and we definitely wouldn't mind coming back here some day! It was fun to walk through the city this morning.
At one point we were going down a street that was lined with trees and all the sudden I looked up and said, "oh, they're orange trees!" Some were also lime, not exactly what we have on the curb at home!
Our train to Venice actually took us back through Pisa (only for 2 minutes) and Florence. We had about 45 minutes in Florence so we went and walked around a bit and saw one last church courtyard close to the station. We definitely loved Florence!
Venice
Our train from Florence got in around 6:30. We are staying just outside of Venice in Miranese. Our Air B&B for tonight is awesome! Our host, Gian Paulo is super nice. He picked us up from the train station, asked what time we would like breakfast tomorrow and even asked if we have any food intolerances! (As little dairy as possible for this girl). The house is also super nice. He even has a cute & friendly dog in the front yard!
The kitchen is huge for Italy, and the fridge is awesome looking (over on the left) 
The living room is also nicer than anything I've seen here (not that I've seen much haha) 
We have our own room and share a bathroom with the other room on the first floor that is rented out.
We quickly dropped off our stuff and jumped on a bus into Venice.
It's quite a different city, how crazy that there are no cars and the "streets" are all canals with boats?
At first we just walked for a while on one of the crowded streets, full of shops, restaurants & street vendors.
We loved all the different bridges everywhere.
There is always something cool to looka t here. We were trying to get to the famous San Marcos square...buuut didn't really plan it out before so we were just walking and wandering. Eventually we made it to a boat taxi station and took that. It was a fun way to see more of the city.
Of course you have your gondola rides....which are way pricey so we'll just be admiring from afar.
We got off a couple of stops before San Marcos, I was thinking oh we're close and we'll see more of the city.
It was true that we saw more things like this:
And we ended up on little streets and bridges not packed with people. That was actual cool to experience that side of Venice a little bit. But truth be told we (especially I) was feeling turned around and in a maze! I just wanted to get to te square with dueling orchestras!
Eventually we made it back to another boat station and jumped on. That have us a great view of this building:
We got off at one of the San Marcos stops and only got turned around a few more times before finally making it to the San Marcos square.
It was awesome! Just after we got there two orchestras started playing at the same time. It was weird to stand in the middle and listen to both. Eventually we chose the one playing the great Andrea Boccelli song "time to say goodbye".
That guy on the bassoon was rocking out like I have never seen from that instrument!
We soaked in the atmosphere and ambiance, even danced a tad. What a fun place!
In general the square is huge and really cool at night.
Now we were on the lookout for dinner.
We found this little place that appeared at first to be on the cheaper end. They had a back garden/courtyard area where we ate. The menus were leather bound!
But somehow they didn't have the price on their salads...which we wanted to split a salad and a pizza. So I just chose the salad I wanted....it had a bunch of delicious seafood in it:
It was a good salad, there was even little octopus things that even had their suckers on them!
Sad part is that the old adage "you are what you eat" is true :( I'm a total sucker because that salad was way more than I ever ever should have paid for it! I'm still kind of bugged at myself about it.
On the plus side our mushroom pizza was absolutely delicious...for less than half the price of the salad!
Oh well, so it goes sometimes I guess. All in all it's been a good yet interesting day.
To get back home we had to take a boat taxi and then a bus. When we got off te boat and were waiting for the bus Russ said to me "where's the backpack?" I thought he was kidding. He wasn't. We have just a little day bag that we take with us most days. Yesterday I had my contact case and glasses in there in case something happened with my eyes. So when we realized that we had left the bag in the restaurant or on the boat taxi we were thinking of everything that was in that bag. I said "oh man, pretty sure my glasses are in there". To which Russ automatically and nonchalantly said "you'll be fine".
If you know me you know I'm blind as a bat. And glasses are pricey! And I only have one pair of contacts with me on this trip. So when he said it was no big deal I was trying not to freak out! Then as we were getting on the bus I was trying not to cry and said "well Venice has stunk!". We sat down and Russ noticed my sunglasses on top of my head and as he was mid sentence of saying "oh your glasses are right...."
And then he realized I had been talking about my actual prescription glasses, not my $3 sunglasses!! Definitely a misunderstanding!! He also thought my glasses being missing was a big deal and we started to try and remember if we left the bag in the restaurant or where....then we realized that we had just packed that day bag for Venice after emptying everything from yesterday into our big bags this morning. Aka my glasses were at our room!! Hurray. Crisis averted. Only a few minutes of distress :) then we could laugh at it haha "you'll be fine". The only thing we really lost in the bag was Russ' jacket...which was kind of on its last leg anyway. So although it had some downsides with it, Venice was cool and we'll see what it brings tomorrow!
We will be meeting up with friends tomorrow for the rest of our trip. We'll be with Chelsie Milne (who we've been friends/neighbors since before we can remember) Liz & Logan Jorgensen (some of our best friends, Logan served in the Alpine Germany mission) and Tom Calton (another lifelong friend of Russ' who also served in the Alpine German mission).
It should be a lot of fun for the last week of our trip! Those guys have been traveling for a week now in Iceland, London, Barcelona, Marseilles & Nice.
I've kind of thought of our trip in 3 parts. The first week was a trip visiting Russ' mission. The week in Italy is our romantic anniversary trip, and the last week in Austria & Switzerland is a fun group trip with friends!
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