Piazza San Marco. The main square of St Marco is impressive, but very touristy.
San Marco. We were there by 10am to beat the crowds, but the square was soon full of people
Basilica di San Marco. This was the best vantage point (from our bums in a nice cafe).
Planning our next move. There was a grand piano playing outside at this huge cafe.
Espresso con Sambucca. Our regular drink! It's the Basilica di San Marco in the background
There are a number of places to pick up gondolas, or you can hail them like cabs if they are free.
Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo. We literally stumbled on this as we were following our noses under arches and through the narrowest streets imaginable.
I'm either waiting for Trevor to take a pic, or figure out vaguely where we are on the map :-)
Small canals... and the tiny bridges. To our delight, Venice was even more beautiful than Rome.
Near the Ponte dell'Accademia, on the grand canal.
Peggy Guggenheim Museum is right on the Grand Canal. It is the most amazing collection of modern art I've ever seen. It's unbelievable that it was her personal collection
Sprizz & pizza on the water. A sprizz is 2 parts wine, 2 parts soda water, big dash Campari, and big dash of Italian liqueur 'Aperol', with an olive!
From the Grand Canal.
Canal Grande. The next few photos were taken from the Vaporetti. It is basically a river bus that runs the length of the Grand Canal.
Canal Grande is 3.5KM. We took the #1, which meandered down the Grand Canal slowly so we could take pictures.
Not sure what this building is now, but they were pretty much all this gorgeous.
Basilica di Santa Maria. This stands at the entrance to the Canal Grande
Leaving Venice for the Mountains. Selva Cadore turned out to have no hotels. We were cold and tired, so backtracked to the only open bar for miles.
This was probably the funniest and most bizarre night I have ever had. We met Mario who brought us food, and insisted on sitting with us. This is Mario & me on the guitare/broom . Mario brought us food and LOTS of grappa. He spoke some English and called his friend and said we could stay there.
We were pretty much expecting to stay on his couch. His name was Bonnie. He spoke no English. We got by on my broken German and mime. It was hilarious. Definitely twilight zone. He insisted Trevor do snuff with him.
He made Trevor do a LINE of snuff, then use this machine. He also had a line-up of home-made instruments he played to us. We have him Jack Daniels, which he was very happy about :)
Santa Fosca. This is the first we saw of the mountain town in the daylight. We had missed how beautiful it was at night.
Bonnie's Guesthouse. We thought we were staying in his spare room, so were relieved to find he actaully owned a hotel.
Nina the baby donkey. Bonnie was insistent we see her. Yes, she was really called Nina.
Bonnie's Moto Guzzi . He got all over-excited and rang his cousin and insisted we go over there before we took off.
He and his cousin had cleaned this up to dispense wine at their parties! See our ride report for details on the bikes.
Bonnie was insistent that I ride with him, and Trevor follow on the BMW.
This was a beautiful day. The scenery changed so much.
One of the many ski areas we drove through.
Mountain Lakes. I guess these are all snow-melt?
Traffic Tunnels... to protect the cars from avalanches.
You might not be able to see at at this low resolution, but there are people paragliding off these mountains.
We drove through scores of these beautiful towns. We had the GPS set to avoid all major roads.
Occasionally the GPS would route us through tiny back-streets, and people would stare at us as they never saw tourists
Castles & Vineyards. We literally took hundred of photos like this. The scenery was all so incredible
This is one of the only photographs (except for the wedding ones) that wasn't taken from a moving vehicle.
We saved this picture, as it is indicative of what we saw a lot that day.
Tyrolean Valleys. One minute we would be on windy mountain roads, and the next we could see over wide glacial valleys
A random castle/house. We'll take two, thanks!
Merano - Famous for its Terme. We decided to save $15 and NOT take the hotel with Terme (hot baths) in the beautiful gardens! What were we thinking?
Merano to Riva del Garda. The day started green and lush, and quickly changed into the breath-taking landscape of the Dolomites.
Passo dello Stelvio. This picture was taken near the beginning. We stopped to help a girl who had fallen at the 3rd turn. Only 40 to go!
Stelvio
