Day 5 Innsbruck To Venice Italy Thursday 26th December 2013:

This morning we were up bright and early after a magical night sleep from celebrating Christmas in Innsbruck.

We made our way to the dining room at 6:30 am for included breakfast in the hotel.

As we had breakfast we shared our favourite experiences from Christmas in Innsbruck.

When we finished breakfast we checked out of our hotel rooms, before taking our bags to the coach at 7 am.

We departed magical Innsbruck and made our way towards our first Italian City of Venice at 7:15am.

As we travelled towards Venice,

Our Trip Manager Rebecca gave us a history lesson about Venice (also known as the floating city)

Our itinerary for Venice included:

Catching a private motorboat to the city, seeing the Bridge of Sighs,the Doges Palace and St Marks Square, free time to explore art filled palazzos and interesting little shops, an optional gondola ride through the canals and ending our time in Venice with an optional dinner at a local Venetian restaurant to start our culinary journey in Italy with some authentic Venetian food,.

Before catching our motorboat back from the city and making our way back to our hotel for the night.

As we made our way through the Alps to Italy via the Brenner Pass we witnessed an amazing site out of the coach window snow covered trees and cars along the road we were travelling.

I had never seen that much snow it my life!

Our Trip Manager Rebecca let us have a short break to experience a snow day in Europe which was so magical!

After experiencing our first time seeing snow!

We made our way back on the coach and drove for another 2 hours before stopping at service stop in Italy.

This service stop was such a great place it had lots of cafes and restaurants with freshly made pasta and pizza,

The staff there had very strong Italian accents which made us realize that we were in Italy now!

As we experienced our first taste of Italian food we drove for another 2 hours before arriving in Venice!

We arrived in Venice at 1 pm and made our way off the coach. We followed our Trip Manager to the Venezia Ferry Port where we caught our motorboat to The Grand Canal.

We arrived at The Grand Canal and made our way off the boat at 2pm.

When we arrived in Venice, we followed Rebecca and she guided us to St Marks Square and where to meet up at 5pm for our optional Gondola Ride.

We had free time until 5pm to explore Venice before our Gondola Ride.

I began exploring Venice by walking through St Marks Square before seeing the Bridge of Sighs and the Grand Canal.

While exploring Venice I went shopping for a Venetian Mask for our Venetian Dinner later tonight which Rebecca suggested would be a great way to remember Venice!

After exploring Venice the group met our Trip Manager Rebecca at St Marks Square at 5pm.

When we arrived at our Gondola Ride Ticket Office, Rebecca organized us into groups of 4 people for each boat before making our way onto the Gondola before departing down the Grand Canal.

This was such an amazing way to see Venice floating down the canals while going under bridges through the Grand Canal!

As our amazing Gondola Ride concluded, we made our way to our Venetian Dinner with our Tour Manager Rebecca.

We arrived at our Venetian Restaurant at 6:30 pm.

We were greeted with 4 bottles of local Venetian Red Wine which are enormous 1 Litre bottles compared to 750ml bottles back in Australia!

We started with entrees of traditional antipasto which consisted of cured meats, olives, peperoncini, mushrooms, anchovies, various cheeses and pickled meats as well as traditional Italian bruschetta which was so great trying authentic Italian food!

For mains we had a selection of Venetian pastas including Seafood Risotto, Bigloi in Salsa and Four Cheese Gnocci which was so delicious.

I have never eaten so much pasta before!

To finish we had some Venetian Gelato for dessert the perfect way to finish our Venetian Feast.

We started our Italian culinary journey with so much wine!

We then departed the Venetian Restaurant and made our way back to the Grand Canal.

We caught our motorboat back into the city and we boarded our coach and made our way to our hotel for the night.

We arrived at our hotel Centrale Hotel Venice Mestre at 9 pm.

When we arrived Rebecca checked us into our hotel rooms.

After checking into our rooms most of the group decided to have a few drinks at the hotel bar before heading to bed to get a good night sleep to be rested for another day of exploring Italy tomorrow.

Safe Travels!

Campbell 🙂