Lake Garda – Venice (200km)
We had always expected this to be a straightforward motorway drive but not exactly the version we encountered.
We took the opportunity to sleep in a bit after the long Day 5 we had experienced but eventually loaded up the car after breakfast. We were on the road by about 10:00am and on our way to Venice. The plan being to arrive by noon, drop our stuff at the hotel and for me to pick up my wife (Vera) at the airport. The plan was to then spend an enjoyable last evening together before Chris headed back to the hectic pace of his work in the suburbs of Chicago. Vera and I would then drive home to Budapest via Austria.
Upon leaving Lake Garda, it looked like the drive would maybe not be too busy and potentially offered some nice scenery. That was quickly washed away once we crossed over the mountain to the east of Lake Garda and entered the A22 motorway. Not only was it busy, it had the ugliest rusted chunk of ironwork guardrail running down the center of the motorway all the way to Verona where the only thing that changed was the color of the ugly ironwork guardrail. At that point it went from ugly rust to ugly silver.
The other problem was trucks. Non-stop trucks from the time we entered the A22 until we left the A4 motorway at Venice. You could have literally walked across the rooftops of trucks all the way from Lake Garda to Venice without ever touching the pavement.
I had realized that the northern part of Italy was very industrialized and had even traveled this road on at least two other occasions. Somehow it was different this time but certainly did not leave Chris with an impression of Italy as the charming old country it is. In any case, it was what it was and we eventually made it to Venice pretty much on schedule.
I dumped Chris at the hotel and headed off to pick up Vera at the airport where she had flown in from Budapest. Once I wound my way through the maze that usually surrounds most airports, I found her sitting at the curb, patiently awaiting my arrival. After a return to the hotel, we quickly got ourselves settled, showered and ready to head off to explore Venice.
For those who have not been to Venice, it is a city about the size of Hyde Park with wall to wall buildings separated by small canals and walkways, and of course – tourists. If the number of people visiting the city could be limited to those you could house in the local hotels, it would be a lovely city to visit.
However, lately cruise lines have discovered the city and often roll in floating hotels housing 3-5k people each. Unfortunately for us, while we were visiting, three of these monsters were berthed in the harbor. This filled the city to the brim with people which kind of took the edge off the specialness of this charming city.
Despite the crowds, we managed to work our way through most of the usual sites and after our third trip to Venice Vera and I actually managed to find St. Mark’s Square. How we have managed to miss it on our two previous trips is a mystery as we clearly must have walked near it on several occasions. In any case, the city was its usual lovely self and we enjoyed some relaxing time over coffee and cakes at a few sidewalk cafes.
We wrapped up the evening with a fantastic dinner at a terrific little restaurant I would highly recommend. It was a place called Osteria Oliva Nera (The Black Olive) located at Castello Street #3417. However, as Vera developed a case of motion sickness (despite the fact that the buildings actually do not move), we decided to head back to the hotel for a good night’s sleep after a long but fun day.
Ciao!
Mike, Chris & Vera
