Venice!!!!!!!!

I'm back from Venice! I had an incredible trip. Venice has to be among the most beautiful cities in the world! The prices were great compared to Switzerland and I ate lots of pasta, pizza, panini, and gelato! We stayed at a nice hotel in Noale--only the rich and famous can afford to stay in Venice itself--and every morning we ate an enormous continental breakfast with the most exquisite coffee. I was well pleased.

For those of you who don't know, Venice was constructed atop a mosaic of more than 100 islands in the middle of a swampy lagoon. The entire city essentially rests on wooden stakes. There are no cars in Venice! Canals wind throughout, so there are many boats, including the famous gondolas and also "water taxis" packed with dozens of tourists.

All went well with helping Marceline. The things I thought would be hard (like going to the bathroom and bathing) weren't a problem and what I thought would be easy (ie: pushing a wheelchair) was hard! Venice is not the city for the handicapped! Luckily her son Julian is in good form...every time you want to go anywhere there's another bridge with stairs to cross! And I dare you to keep a wheelchair steady on cobblestone streets! But the museum curators and restaurant workers and boat operators were very accomodating. Plus, everything is free for those in wheelchairs! It was an enriching experience to see life from another perspective and I was happy to be able to help make the trip possible for Marceline.

All went well, so I don't really have any amusing stories of my trip (barring the time I cried at the restaurant because I couldn't read the Italian menu...), but I'll describe more of what we did in the photo captions below. The pictures are the best way to tell the story of Venice because it's really a trip for the eyes--not a lot of activities necessarily, but plenty of beautiful sights to take in. It was extremely difficult to choose these photos because there were dozens more I wanted to show you!