North to Venice

At the back of my head every night and every time we got into the car, for that matter, was the drive that we would make from Tuscany to Venice. On our map, it looked like a pretty straight forward shot. I had done a little research and knew that we were going to have to find a place to park and then find a way to get from where we parked to Venice itself, That's the part that scared me. If I thought too long about it, a pit of fear would grow in my stomach.

Thankfully, things have changed a lot since the last time I was in Europe. Our little villa had free wifi. Every night before I went to sleep, I would google parking and driving advice. One night while googling advice on where to park for the 3rd or 4th time, I came upon a recommendation that made the most sense to me. Park at the airport in Venice. Seemed brilliant to me.

The airport should be clearly marked, making it easy to find. There should be no need to worry that the parking lot was full. Those two reasons alone seemed good enough to me.

So on the early morning of June 17, 2012, we loaded up the car and headed north to Venice. For the first couple of hours, we settled into an easy quiet. The girls promptly fell asleep after having stayed up late the night before. Liz and I enjoyed the scenery and the way the surroundings changed as we moved further and further North. Soon, we began to see signs for the airport and train station and my anxiety began to build.

Remembering my conversation with my dad who had just come back from Venice, I talked to Liz about changing my plans and parking at the train station instead. Dad had told me that it was at the entrance to Venice and for a moment I doubted my idea of using the airport as our parking lot. After some discussion back and forth, I decided to stick with my plan and we continued to follow the signs to the airport.

As we drove to the entrance we were greeted with signs in Italian and English guiding us to a long term parking lot. I was amazed at how easily everything fell into place. We parked the car, gathered our bags and walked to the terminal not sure of what we were to do next. Once at the front of the terminal, we asked someone how to get to Venice and we were quickly told that if we kept walking in the direction we were headed, we would come to water taxis that would take us to Venice.

I still could not believe how easy this was. The one place I was most worried about getting to was turning out to be the easiest place to get to. The water taxi area was alive with tourists coming and going. A private taxi was ridiculously expensive so we opted for a water bus where a roundtrip ticket for the four of us was cheaper than a one way private water boat.

Before I knew it, we were on the boat heading to the destination of my dreams.

Venice.