Day9: Final Day!

Good bye to the Crown Princess!  

We had a great night last night because the boat wasn't moving for once!  Lol....it was really only bumpy a couple of nights because there were storms that we went through.  Having a suite on the back of the boat was a real treat. We were all by our lonesome back there so there was never any noises from other people that we had to deal with.  We were able to get a 'special' disembarkation because of being in the suite.  Yay!  There were hardly any people in our meeting area. What a difference!

We headed out around 9:45 and the ship took care of getting our luggage to the hotel. That was soooo worth it. I have already been feeling like a pack mule, so I was happy that we didn't have to tote our luggage through St. Marks Square. 

We hit the pavement running!  We were trying to get in two days worth of sightseeing in one day. We toured Doge's Palace first.  It was an amazing place!  Last year we didn't get a chance to do this tour, so I was happy to fit it in this time,  there was no line....that in itself was a miracle...so we walked right in and did the self-guided tour with there recorders that worked like phones!  If you ever get to do this trip, the recorders are definitely the way to go.  Mom and I enjoyed that because it was easy and we could go at our own pace.  When we got to the weapons room, I was really wishing the boys and Ted had been with us. There were two rooms full of ancient weapons ranging from the smallest arrow to the very ornate powder guns. Awesome!  

Towards the end of the tour you cross the Bridge of Sighs. They call it that because the saying goes that the prisoners would sigh as they crossed over the canal before they entered their cells.  I took some pictures of the canal as we walked over. If you have Instagram go look at them. I'm golfingbev. If not, come back in a couple of days. I am going to try and post some pictures with these posts when I get back home. 

We then ate a quick pizza and we were off again.  One thing to remember if you get to come this way...a lot of the cafés charge a surcharge for just sitting down!  The café we ate at charged $2.50/person...stiff huh!?  Anyway, after that we took off for the Jewish ghetto. It is called that because in ancient times that was the only place the Jews were allowed to live.  It was pretty different from the other areas. It was very clean and not near as many tourists. 

Next stop was to find the Ponte Calatrava.  It is the only modern (metal) bridge in Venice. We jumped on the public water taxi and that was an experience for mom. She couldn't believe how many people you could cram onto one of those boats!  We made it to the bridge.  Really interesting because it was just a block north of the train station.  That's we're we came into Venice last year and I never noticed that it was there.  The bridge connects you to the bus terminal and also to the only area of Venice where you can drive a car.  Pretty neat. 

We then pushed on to go back towards the Rialto Bridge and St. Marks Square. Believe it or not at this point we have not even gotten into our hotel room. Couldn't believe mom was able to do all this walking. Remember, you are not only walking but constantly going up and over bridges.  We may it all the way back to the hotel on foot!

 Our hotel is the Luna Baglioni and it is located near the right hand corner (facing the canal)
 of St. Marks Square.  It is also right on the canal. It's absolutely gorgeous. We will get our water taxi to the airport right outside the hotel door.  Check it out online!

We ended the day with a little more shopping, dinner and then back to the hotel. We have had a great time but I'm ready to get home!

Chow!