Day 7 - More on Venice

There seemed to a church on each island, so there were lots to see.  This was where our walking tour ended. about noon. The ship wasn't scheduled to leave until 6 pm so I had plenty of time to walk to St. Mark's Square to catch the shuttle back to the ship.  I did want to shop for a few souvenirs.  I had studied a little bit about finding my way back to St. Marks and knew the signs to look for up higher on the corners of buildings.

The tour guild took a long time telling the story of Marco Polo and how this was his home.  After he had us hook, line and sinker he admitted that no one is sure this was his home, but it's a good place to stop in the tour.

Bell towers galore.

This was the little restaurant that I found for lunch.  Had pizza.

Most of the morning walk was not very crowded.  Looked at some glass shops and of course jewelry always catches my eye.  As I got closer to Piazza San Marco it started getting much more crowded.

The bell tower in Piazza San Marco.

Basilica San Marco

These are the shops surrounding Piazza San Marco.

This is some of the interesting jewelry in those shops.

The Doge's Palace

This is the Torre dell'Orologio, a 15th century clock tower.

The winged lion of St. Mark.

I think I headed for the shuttle back to the ship about 2:30 pm.  The ship sailed at 8 pm, and I never wanted to risk missing the last shuttle.  Besides by then I was pretty tired and looked forward to a short nap.  And to see how Deborah enjoyed her excursion that day.

Tomorrow we have a day in Split, Croatia.

Day 7 - 2nd day in Venice

The second day I had scheduled the "Secret Venice Walking Tour.  Since the departure time for this tour I had to be up at 6 am to get to the gathering point to join the group and leave the ship at 7:30 am
The walking tour was 4 hours and then we had some time on our own but had to be back to the ship by 6 pm.  At the terminal we got on a smaller boat that took us west and around the end of the islands to the back canals.

Something that hadn't occurred to me was how all the daily supplies got to the island.  I think most come by rail and then are loaded onto these smaller boats that then got through the canals to deliver items.

Once we had gotten to the back of the island we got off and began our 4 hr. walking tour.

Business on the 1st and 2nd floors, living space on 3rd.

Since all the building are build one onto another, each island has a little square where kids can get out and plan and older people can sit and visit under the shade of a tree.

Day 6 - Venice, Italy

I'm not sure what time we left Kotor.  Probably as soon as everyone was back aboard, because we had to cross the Adriatic Sea as our next destination was Venice, Italy. There was quite a storm overnight but I never heard it.  But did look out the window a couple of times to see how high the waves were. Venice was going to be a 2 day stay.

We didn't arrive in Venice until after 1 pm.  So the morning was spent getting a little sun and lunch.  Everyone was on deck taking lots of photos as we entered the Canale Della Giudecca headed for the terminal.

Piazza San Marco

At 4:15 pm we finally docked and got off the boat for my first excursion.  I took the Venice panorama, a tour on a private motor boat that took us to see all the islands in the lagoon.
This was a nice way to get an overview.  Tour took a little over 2 hours.

Venice at sunset

I got back about 6:58 pm, had dinner and retired for the night as I knew I has a four hour walking tour scheduled for tomorrow.

I'm not sure which tour Debra took today.  I know on one of the two days she took the tour to Murano glass and Burano lace. She even bought a chandler which really intrigued many of the quilters.

Day 5 - Kotor, Montenegro

This morning was our first morning in a port, Kotor, Montenegro.  When we went to sleep we were cruising around the heel of Italy.  When we awoke we had mountains on both sides of the ship.  I called it a fjord which I am not sure would be the proper Montenegro term.

To get into the port we had to take a tender in.  A covered life board ship that is lowered down from Deck 5 and we disembarked from I think Deck 2.  I had to be ready and in the theater ready to leave to get on the tender.  So it was an early rise to get breakfast before having to be at the meeting point.
I had not signed up for any specific tour today.  Thought I would play the first day ashore by ear.

There were a number of quilters who also went ashore with this intention.  I hooked up with 2 ladies from Brooklyn. When we got to the dock there were all kinds of people hawking private limo tours, etc.  We opted for a double-decker bus that went all the way up the fjord and back with the hop on/hop off possibilities.            

There were lots of interesting flora to see. I was surprised to see so many cacti.

The ride out the fjord was very beautiful and the water so blue.  Temps were about 86 degrees.

Also included was a stop at some Roman ruins that had been excavated with wonderful mosaic floors. Lots of ideas for quilts.

About half way out, maybe 10 miles, there was a point where we could get off and explore another city, but it looked to be uphill all the way so we passed.

In some areas of the fjord there are farming salmon.

When we returned to the city from the bus trip we decided to explore the walled part of the city.  Some buildings dated to as early as 1166.  We looked through what passes for a mall in Kotor.  Maybe 12 shops including a news stand, a pharmacy and a sandwich shop.

As we reached the entrance to the walled city we met one of the other quilters who had just finished a guided walking tour of the city.  She offered to show us some of the highlights.  So we followed along.

This was St. Triphon's Cathedral, 1166

Got a kick out of this sign.  Well they didn't say you couldn't take a picture.!!

Church of St. Nicholas, 1909

High above the city was the Church of our Lady of Remedy, 1518.  I noticed that some of the people on the trip always spotted the highest point and headed there.  It was bad enough that the city was all uphill, we choose now to take the mile or more uphill walk.

I considered taking the bus out again, but it didn't come.  So after a lengthy wait I decided to head back down to the tender.  The last one would be at 4 pm and I didn't want to risk missing it my first time ashore.

After dinner we went to the theater and saw the movie Mother's day.