Day 7

May 31

We woke up bright and early and headed downstairs for breakfast. Cheese and eggs, fruit filled croissant, yogurt, and cappuccino was on my menu. There was also a lovely fruit filled basket that I had taken for decoration, but I was convinced otherwise later by Nanny. I spotted a pale orange apricot among the other fruit and was curious enough to grab it. However, after everything else I’d had to eat, I calculated that it wouldn’t quite fit into my overloaded but happy stomach. So into my pocket it went. The plan was to be at some tourist station for 9:00 am. We left the hotel around 8:50, running late as per usual. We decided it best to take a taxi rather than the metro so as not to be left behind. We made it there with time to spare, and chatted it up with another couple of tourists. As a group, we were led through the city of Milan by a pretty blond lady brandishing a blue umbrella as a marker, should we get lost. I’ll let the rest be told by pictures if you don’t mind, except for the Last Supper, which we were forbidden from taking pictures of due to the deterioration of the painting. It was much larger than I had imagined, and protected more strictly than water in Arabia. Someone along the way had cut a door through the wall on which it resides, thereby removing the feet of our lord, and the paint appeared thin in some places, but all of that aside it was really a beautiful work of art.

After the tour had reached its conclusion and the group had dispersed, we went back through the area we had window shopped through the evening before. I only bought some clothes from one trendy yet affordable store, mostly things in bright colors. We left around 3:30, as the train to our next destination left the station at 6:05. Back at the hotel, the first taxi we called insisted that our oversized luggage would absolutely defiantly not fit in his trunk. Cabbie number two was considerably more helpful, dragging the small houses in which we had packed our things so tightly into the back of his SUV. We laughed when he took them out of that SUV, pulled out the handles, and started to roll both of them behind him into the station. We laughed as well when he came to the escalator, barred by three metallic posts so as to deter wheelchairs and strollers. But he made it up and into the station without a hernia. He even told took our ticket to the information desk and told us where to wait for our train. There we sat and watched the train time board for our train. There had been some worry about whether or not our luggage would fit on board, or what would become of them, and as our train pulled into the station, it didn’t go away. We got on board and a really nice man who didn’t speak a word of English hoisted our possessions on board, where we waited for someone, anyone, to tell us what to do with them. After a while, the conclusion was drawn to situate them behind the furthest back seat on the car, and as the train was nowhere near max capacity, we sat in the seats next to them, stretching out about the empty seats surrounding us. When the train official came around, he was more concerned with our lack of something called a “Eurail pass” (which we did not know the existence of). No mention was made of our luggage. That is until Nanny went toward the front to chat with someone or another and the snack cart came, or tried to come, into our car. When he was unable to press his cart unto the door way due to our fire hazard luggage in the way, he began to utter cries for assistance in babbling Italian. Embarrassed and slightly amused, I and another passenger went to help him, rearranging the luggage to allow his passage. The train ride was about three hours long, and I spent the time envying the poppies that could be see flying by the window. Toward the end of the trip, we pulled up at a station marked with some word not at all similar to “Venice” and worried ourselves that this might be our stop and we might be missing it. I convinced Nanny to poke her head out of the train car door and ask someone “Is this Venice?” The man who answered her said that no, it was not Venice, making us feel like the biggest dummies to ever grace the earth. When we did exit our stop, the station was deserted. Nanny asked me how to say “Do you speak English” in Italian, and I replied that I didn’t know. Figuring that since Italian is so like Spanish, she asked me how to say it in Spanish. I replied “Hablas el ingles?” So that is what she asked the singular man who was walking in the station. He had no clue what she was talking about. So out of the station we went, to a flight of stairs outside. Some man offered to help Nanny carry her luggage down when she exasperatedly asked the people sitting around if there was a ramp or something to get down. There is not a doubt in my mind that he regretted his offer the moment he first attempted to pick up the 70+ pound suit case. But he got it down and she thanked him for his troubles. I just dragged mine down the stairs, too tired to care anymore. We took a water taxi from the Venice station to our hotel, and cheap it was not. There are no cars in Venice. Let me say it again, since it was so hard for me to believe. There are no cars in Venice. We arrived at our hotel, Nanny requiring some assistance exiting the boat, and were thoroughly impressed. It had the grandeur of old times, with the luxury of modern electricity. The room is beautiful, with a glass chandelier hanging from the dark wooden beamed ceiling. We prepared for bed, and our tired minds fell asleep the moment they hit the pillows.