Beautiful Socks, Beautiful People...

Saturday 4, October: Sadly it's Saturday and no Starchini & Hutchollo and no time for a visit with our PI friends. We are off to catch the vaporetto for the train station. After getting off the vaporetto, but before going into the train station, we decided to walk over the final bridge that crosses the Grand Canal (with all of our luggage!!), so now we've crossed them all...four for four!! On the train when all of the little old Italian ladies reached into their purses and began pulling out lunch for all the little old Italian men...we reached into our bag and pulled out our luch too. One sweet old guy toasted us with his bread and hard boiled egg. We arrived in Varenna on Lago Di Como.....

enough said.

Sunday 5, October: Jim has done his research and Varenna only has five stores, and one of them is a hair salon...thank goodness because these socks have shopped 'till they dropped in Venice and are looking forward to just kicking back. We had a tasty breakfast with a view of the lake. Grabbed my sweater and headed down the stairs. One of the four actual stores is at the bottom of the stairs....and I now own a new purple pashmina sciarpa! So much for not shopping (...it's really cold here I needed a scarf!!). Still looking for the PI...feeling a little lonely for some postal company! Headed for Bellagio tomorrow....lots of shops and looking for George (Clooney that is).

Monday 6, October: Another great breakfast (although Jim didn't have his morning pesca...have to find a pesca store in Bellagio!). Jumped on the autotraghetto (a people/car ferry) to Bellagio. Jim has been really studying the schedule and he was perfectly correct on the departure time (who had any doubts??).

Bellagio: Beautiful people, beautiful shops, beautiful pesce! I now own sciarpe in every color, for every climate. Walked down to the Punta, where you can see down both legs of the lake, and on a clear day (like today) north to the Alps...beautiful too!


Ate dinner at Jim's trattoria (Trattoria S. Giacomo), couldn't wait an hour for an indoor table (needed to catch the last ferry home) so we took the only free table, outdoors...sciarpa and trattoria provided blanket mandatory. To complete the beautiful day look at the beautiful person we spotted on a side street of Bellagio...not too happy about having his picture taken....

Socks Soak In Acqua Alta....

Thursday 2, October: After watching the morning episode of Starchini & Hutchollo and our morning visit to the PI (Italian post office), we headed back to the lavanderia. €66 (yes, you read that right, €66!) later, we left with our new pink wardrobe. Jim's green martini underwear are now serving cosmos! I guess I didn't stress enough the need for two loads of laundry...one bianca and one colori...even though they were in separate bags!! Oh well, we like pink. We went to another mask shop and bought masks for me and another one for Jim.

We walked over the Accademia bridge (we have now crossed 3 of the 4 bridges over the Grand Canal). We headed for the Sestiere of Dorsoduro to eat at a pizza place Jim read about. When we found it, Jimmy "not by the slice" Leonardini, wouldn't eat there since they only sold take out pizza. We ended up eating in an outdoor trattoria and watched some sort of college initiation party (lots of prosecco being consumed!). After lunch we found another Grom gelatoria! Yum really, really good gelato! We walked back to our hotel by way of the Rialto bridge and Jim bought me a fine Italian purple leather knitting bag (too cute!!). The owner comment that Jim must be Italian because "you have our face". As we left Jim commented, " I may have their face, but they have my money!!"

Friday 3, October: Of course, Starchini & Hutchollo and then it's back to the PI. This time we actually mailed two boxes home. We've heard the spare room already looks like the Posteitalia shipping warehouse! We wandered around the shops some more, after all we have a lot of room in our suitcases now! Bought bread and cheese and meats for the travel day on Saturday. There are the beginnings of Acqua Alta in Piazza San Marco, hopefully the weather will hold out until we get to the train tomorrow. We bought some pressings from a street artist and then headed to Harry's bar for a rest. We drank Bellinis next to Jeffrey Harharwood (Seinfeld) and the rest of the "beautiful people" (no pictures allowed). We decided to return to the restaurant we found by accident earlier in the week...our complete 3 course dinner with wine and espresso, was less than the two Bellinis at Harry's bar!

Socks Saunter Six Sestieri...

Tuesday 30, September: Awoke to another beautiful Venetian day. Jim has discovered Starchini & Hutchollo on morning television here (Yes, that is Starski & Hutch!!). We went to the post office (again) and then headed off for some target shopping. We are a little concerned as there seems to be more Acqua Alta tables being stacked in preparation of...well, Acqua Alta. We have a list of traditional mask makers and hoped to locate some of them and check on getting a mask. We went to the Rialto bridge and purchased a hand made leather-bound wedding scrapbook (thank you to our friends at the City of Stockton!!) and a hand made photo album for the wedding pictures (thank you, Ken and Yvonne!!). We also bought some beautiful paintings from a local artist.

Wednesday 1, October: After Starchini & Hutchollo and of course our morning visit to the post office (bear in mind...we have not mailed anything yet, just visited!!), we set off with our bags of dirty clothes in search of a laundry. We learned last time we were in Venice...clothes never dry here, they just grow mold. We actually located the lavanderia without too much trouble (ok, maybe Rick Steves is not an idiot after all). We headed off to visit some of the other Sestieri (the most visited are the Castello and San Marcos as that is where the Rialto and San Marcos are located). Jim finally broke down and bought a map (he refused to buy the €6.50 map...the €2.50 map will work just fine...look where that got us!...what you can't see is that one of these arrows is pointing into the Grand Canal)

We returned to the Rialto bridge so we could visit the shop of the mask maker who made all the masks for "Eyes Wide Shut". While we didn't buy one of his masks it was fun to see pictures of all the stars who have purchased masks from him. We walked all through Sestiere San Polo and couldn't find the mask maker on my list. We did finally find one, but she was closed for lunch. We decided to eat and had a great lunch at a little bar (ate lunch and people watched just like you wanted to do, Mom). After lunch we opted against any of the masks at that store and we headed to the next Sestiere, Santa Croce. In Santa Croce we actually located one of the mask makers on the list and Jim bought a beautiful mask from a mask maker who only spoke French!! Now that was a conversation to listen to! We walked across the new bridge, Il Ponte Calatrava, that was just constructed to cross the Grand Canal (prior to it's construction there were only three bridges that crossed the Grand Canal).

We headed for our next Sestiere, Cannaregio. We were looking for a restaurant that Jim's uncle had eaten at and told us about. Of course, in Venice there are no street names in the addresses, just Sestiere names and a number. We have yet to figure out the numbering system, but after talking to eight different people and getting directions as we went we found the restaurant, Osteria Quarante Ladrone. We had a great meal and a lot of fun. Jim finally got good counsel from Avvocato Giacomo. We decided that was enough walking for one day and took a vaporetto home and enjoyed a beautiful night cruise of the grand canal.