Shortly after my husband and I got married ten years ago, we said for our 5th anniversary that we would travel to Italy to celebrate as I had always dreamed of taking a gondola ride down the infamous canal in Venice.
When our 5th anniversary rolled around, we were not in a position to take such a trip with my husband being in school and two young babies in the house, so that dream was put on hold.
Fast-forward five years and my husband and I were able to take our dream trip and it fell nothing short of being just that. So I will be recapping our trip with all of our favorite stops, eats, and activities, as well as the things we would have done differently!
Our first stop was… VENICE! And we loved it every bit as much as we thought we would. I know some say it is oversaturated with tourists, but being tourists ourselves, we were able to see past all of that and fully enjoy all of the beauty that surrounds this city.
As I had previously mentioned, I hired a travel agent to take care of the nitty-gritty, and our hotel was located right on one of the canal’s and I could not have been more pleased! (Right behind the bridge in the photo below.) We stayed at the Casa Nicolo Priuli and it looked just like an old Venetian house. We LOVED being right in the middle of the action and it made for getting around extremely easy. The actual room was tucked back a bit, so everything was nice and quiet. Plus it included breakfast in the morning which helped us save.
I took these photos on our first day there and I could just not get enough of everything around us. We didn’t have an agenda this day but just planned on wandering and getting lost in the city, allowing it to take us wherever it wanted.
I also gave myself permission to gain 10 guilt-free pounds as I was going to fully indulge in everything Italy had to offer. And something to note, and something we found surprising; not all food in Italy is as incredible as you might expect! Some pizzas were DEFINITELY better than others, some pasta was DEFINITELY better than others, and the same goes for gelato, too! My best advice is to follow your eyes and nose, and to look before you sit. We discovered that looking at what others were eating before deciding on a restaurant proved to be the best outcome for us. (Note-Because we walked and walked and walked all around Italy, neither of us gained a pound… so…. ENJOY!)
After a wonderful first few hours of exploring, we were WIPED. I mean WIPED. The lack of sleep was starting to catch up with us, so at this point, all we wanted to do was to sit down, rest, and enjoy our surroundings. So, we decided to find a nice place to sit and relax. The restaurants in St. Mark’s square are SO pricey. I am talking $15 for a cappuccino and $25 for a mixed drink. BUT, they do have live music that is actually REALLY good, and if you want to sit and people watch, this is a great option and some time we really enjoyed.
We went back to our hotel around 9:00 that night and thought we would crash… but we really didn’t because of the time difference! So I highly recommend taking a sleep-aid to help you fall asleep while there. Melatonin was my bff at night.
The next day we went out exploring once again and ended up wanting to tour St. Mark’s Basilica since we were just in awe of it. You can buy pretty cheap skip-the-line tickets/tours to go inside like THIS ONE, and we ended up doing this last-minute. They were around $30 each and actually came with a little 30-minute history lesson. We actually really enjoyed the little lesson as it helped us to understand everything we were looking at.
Photo taken from on top of St. Mark’s; we thought it was worth going to the top!
Note- Women must have their shoulders covered when entering most churches, so make sure you bring a light cardigan, shawl, or use that cooling towel I told you about in the last post to cover your shoulders with! Often times the knees need to be covered, too, so just make sure you know ahead of time what the church requires.
The ONLY thing I really wanted to do in Venice was to ride in a gondola. Everything else was bonus in my book. So on our last night (we only stayed two nights), we did just that. Originally I had booked the gondola in advance but then canceled last minute because I didn’t want to feel rushed if we were in the middle of something else. And I am glad I did! This is something you do not need to book ahead of time. There are gondoliers everywhere ready to take you down the beautiful waters. AND, you can get a better price! While walking around, two gondoliers informed us that a daytime ride costs $80, and after 7:00 it goes up to $100. It was around 6:00 when we were talking with them, and they offered us a ride for $70, so we took them up on it! The only thing we wanted to do before was to get some Gelato from a highly-reviewed place online, but these gondoliers advised us elsewhere, and it couldn’t have been more perfect!
Before going to Venice we watched Phil Rosenthal’s show, “Somebody Feed Phil,” which is basically Phil going to all of the best restaurants in various cities and sharing them on this show. Well, one of the places shared was La Boutique del Gelato in Venice and we couldn’t have been more thrilled to have seen the same woman behind the counter as seen on the show.
I mean I TOTALLY had a fangirl moment!
So we took that amazingly delicious gelato with us and had one incredibly memorable ride. Truly, it was exactly as I had hoped for. And, since the original ride I booked was somewhere between $100-$120, and we ended up going for $70, it was just a total win all-around.
That night we went to the most delicious little spot that had a number of these little croquettes for an amazing deal! And I am kicking myself for not remembering the name of this amazing little spot! But, it was right across the water from a gondola repair shop, which I think might be the only one around…
And after we ate, we just strolled around picking up a few little goodies for the kids and just got lost in the city. I loved this city so much!
I shared so many videos and photos of our trip on my Instagram account; just look for the saved highlight titled “Venice” for even more tips, tricks and a ton of videos!
Our next stop was ROME and my gosh do I have some amazing tips and tricks for that city! Stay-tuned!
