Last night we spent in the Lyon Airport hotel. The hotel is in the terminal, so we went into the terminal at about 9:30 to look for dinner. Who would ever think we would be eating dinner in an airport. We found a small café (some pilots were eating there so we figured that it must be OK…they should know).

We woke up early to catch the 9:10 plane to Venice. It’s a small plane. There are two seats on one side and a single seat on the other. But they do serve a good cup of coffee and a nice crossiant. A short flight, one hour. Sort of like LAX to SJC.

Venice is warm and sunny! We take a water taxi to the hotel (just like a fairy tale relived). This hotel is right on the Grand Canal, very old and very elegant. This building dates back to the 14th century. In 1822 it became a hotel. Dickens, Charlie Chaplin, Greta Garbo, Balzac all have stayed here. This is a place to stay. We have two rooms that connect by a corridor, these hotel rooms are perhaps bigger than our Paris Apartment. The connecting corridor is bigger than most of our hotel rooms. The bathrooms are certainly bigger than ours in Santa Monica. Our rooms aren’t ready so we drop the luggage and head out into the sunshine. We walk over some bridges and through some back streets and stop in at a small canal side café for lunch. Sarah has gnocchi with tomato sauce, I have spaghetti with tomato sauce (can’t remember the last time I had a plate of pasta for lunch!) Marc and Em have incredibly thin crusted pizza. Yum.

We walk back to our hotel and get set up in our rooms. We then venture back out. The sky now looks a little gray, maybe it’s going to rain later. We go to Piazzo San Marco and watch all the pigeons and the people. Not sure which there are more of. Marc read somewhere that 20% of the pigeons carry salmonella. A lot of the tourists are buying corn from vendors on the square and feeding the pigeons so that they will sit on their arms. Yuck. Hope they have their Purell.

For the next couple of hours we roam around. Marc says this is “one big gift shop”. It’s sort of true. TONS of shops with Murano glass, masks etc. . The girls need to check out every store, so we do. And they make some purchases, some for themselves and some for friends. Em and I buy wallets and Sarah buys a beautiful purple notebook for writing. Marc buys a shoelace (his broke). Sarah is out of all of her books (even the ones we bought in Paris, so we are not sure what we will do for the ride home), so I think we will be looking around Venice for a bookstore with English books.

Just when we were commenting on how there didn’t seem to be any locals around, we see an older woman (at least 80) coming out of her walk up with grocery bags in hand. I guess there are a few locals. We are walking behind her and then suddenly she is a bit stooped over walking more slowly…I am worried that something is the matter, maybe she is having difficulty? I catch up to her to see and can’t believe that she is hunched over her……blackberry, texting away! Oh well.

It starts to sprinkle so we decide to head back to the hotel. Now the street vendors are selling umbrellas! The hotel is so comfortable, we decide to hang out here for awhile before our dinner reservations at 8:30. Marc made reservations at the hotel restaurant, which is supposed to be really great. Marc and I open the wine the hotel left for us and relax. The girls break into their usual game with new found gusto.

We rest and the rain continues. So we decide that the Terrace restaurant maybe isn’t the best choice for dinner tonight. We pour through our guide books and look for something closeby. The concierge gives us a recommendation and we head in that direction but get a bit off track. We stumble on another place and it looks good. The absolute BEST thing about Italy is that there is NO smoking in any inside venue. That includes, hotels, restaurants and stores. This is amazing compared to the last time we were here. It makes all the difference at meals (especially compared to Paris). The restaurant is crowded but we take the last table for 4. The other interesting thing about this restaurant is that they have an entire page offering “1/2 portions” I have never seen this outside a children’s menu. We all get a first and second course, but only ½ portions….all except Sarah’s first course: Caprese salad. She gets spaghetti with pesto for her second course, as does Emily. Marc, Emily and I all get stuffed squash blossoms for our first course (stuffed with ricotta and basil) and Marc and I both get cuttle-fist with polenta for our second courses (this is a Venetian speciality). The girls (and Marc get ½ desserts). Marc and I have espressos (full size!). The other interesting thing is that at this restaurant, as at the restaurant at the Abbaye, had differential menus for men and women (no prices on our menus). I haven’t seen that in awhile.

We walk home in the sprinkling rain. I am hoping that it is clear tomorrow as we want to do a lot of walking. We are planning to go to Murano and also to the Jewish Ghetto.

In Europe WiFi is pronounced "wee fee"...we just love that!