Gail and John'sTravels: Our Tour Ends ... in Venice

Finally, after more than forty days our cruise ship arrived in Venice. We had visited Venice about 16 months ago yet it was wonderful to see it again from the ship as we sailed into the harbour past the colourful buildings and, especially, St. Mark’s (San Marco) Square.

Sailing into Venice

St. Mark's Square in the morning

The ship docked in the cruise harbour right across the Crystal Serenity, ironically the ship that we will be on next January sailing from Los Angeles to Japan.

Crystal Serenity in the distance as we sail in

All of our art supplies were finally packed into 14 boxes. We discovered on the second last day of the cruise that nowhere on the boat was there any packing tape for the boxes. So off we went into town by a “people mover train” and vaporetti (water bus) into St. Mark Square.

Venice from the Vaporetti

Rialto Bridge from the Vaporetti

While other tourists were out enjoying the sights, we were going to several stores we knew of to find packing tape. We were unsuccessful until we came to a store that sold Murano glass beads, some of which Gail purchased. Asking the sales clerk if they shipped worldwide, the girl said that they did. In a flash of inspiration, Gail said to her “Well, you must have packing tape”. Anyway, to make the story short, the girl sold us two rolls of packing tape and our problem was solved.

Venice was as beautiful as ever, even though it was raining.