Venice & Verona

March 24. 2019

A weekend to remember.

The organization that I decided to study abroad through is called USAC & throughout the semester they plan events & trips that we are able to attend. This weekend was the Venice & Verona trip that they planned for us. We spent two nights & two days in Venice & then one day in Verona. Most of my program went on this overnight trip which made it so fun! We were able to get to know everyone a little bit more!

On Thursday we took an early morning train (4 hours) to Venice. Our hotel was luckily right next to the train station which was really nice because it is hard to travel with luggage in Venice since their "streets" are water canals. Venice is a city that is surrounded by water which was really cool!!

We had a walking tour with a tour guide around Venice. The things that we saw was the Bride of Sighs, St. Mark's Campanile, St. Mark's Clocktower, and St. Mark's Basilica. The Basilica was filled with gold mosaics which was absolutely STUNNING. The gold was gorgeous and was hard to take my eyes off of it. Venice was just such a cool city to was around because each street was so different and there was so much water everywhere.

That night we went out to a bar called Orange Bar. On Thursday nights it is Karaoke night! So we all were jamming out to songs such as bohemian rhapsody & makarena. It was such a fun night hanging out with everyone & just having a good time!

The next morning we went to Verona for the day. Went first went to lunch at a restaurant that was in an old church. We had prosciutto, gnocchi, & some kind of coconut dessert. It was a pretty good meal.

After lunch we had a walking tour around Verona. We went and saw the Santa Maria Antica which is a catholic church that had multiple people's graves on the outside. It was cool because they built their graves above the ground to show their power. We went to Juliet's house and saw the balcony of Juliet. It was a but underwhelming which was very upsetting. The idea of the house is very interesting & romantic. Finally we went to the Verona Arena. The Verona Arena was really pretty and had an amazing view of the city.

On Saturday we had a free day, so we decided to walk around and explore the city. It was so nice out so walking around was so fun! I am loving the spring weather!!! At one point we stopped and sat down along the water and soaked in the sun. Venice is home to the amazing fruity drink "bellini". A Bellini cocktail is a mixture of Prosecco sparkling wine and peach purée or nectar. So at lunch we each enjoyed a glass of Bellini while in the warm sun.

The last thing we did before heading back to Torino was we got Gelato at Gelatoteca Suso. Let me tell ya... this was by far the best gelato I have had thus far!!! It was so creamy & delicious. And there was a cute bridge near by that had a cute view of all the Gondola rides.

Side note: I am coming back to Venice so I will be doing a Gondola ride then. But yes the Gondoliers do wear black & white striped sweaters with black vests. It was just like the movies haha!!

Signing off.

Kayla Nicole