I was struggling to figure out where to go on vacation after a weekend in London when I saw a photo of this little island town called Burano, near Venice. I decided I had to go there to see it for myself. So, I booked a trip to Venice, once there I had to figure out how to get there. The journey is faaaaaar longer than Google had informed me. I’ll tell you more about it in another post.
As you scale the citadel in Sisteron, you’re treated to views of the hamlet at the foot of the mountain across the Duran river from the town center.
When I stumbled my way upon this dock, I thought I’d discovered an awesome little secret spot to see the Rialto and watch the activity on the Grand Canal. I started taking some pictures when I saw a man approaching, holding a closed umbrella above his head. He was a tour-guide, and sure enough my quiet spot on a tiny dock on the Grand Canal was soon overrun by about 20 people. I decided to step back off the dock and wait until they all left, which only took a few minutes.
If you look in the background of this picture, you can see the Rialto bridge.
On our first day in Venice, my dad and I walked across the Rialto bridge and got fairly lost while wandering around on the other side. When it came time to find lunch, we worked our way back towards the Grand Canal and a Vaporetto stop. We hopped on the first one to pull up and were on our way to San Marco square. On the way, I saw the below building with gilded frescoes on its facade. I thought it was just a really fancy house, but it turns out it’s a landmark called the Palazzo Salviati.
This little bridge is a landmark in Hoi An, Vietnam. The first bridge was constructed here in 1590 by the Japanese community to link them with the Chinese quarters on the other side of the river.
This is actually the first photo I took in Venice while wandering, completely lost, in the general direction of the Rialto. I wound up combining two different photos so that I could have the gondola, and the flag with the lion of Venice unfurled in the same photo.
I’m back in London now, Bermuda on Sunday.
Long day at work, so quick post… here’s the other bicycle I waited ages for while on the Japanese Covered Bridge in Hoi An.
So, I’m back from my trip to Marrakech, London and Amsterdam. I went on an awesome food tour in Marrakech I’m looking forward to telling you about. For now though, we’ve got another picture from Vietnam. This is the view from inside the Japanese covered bridge in Hoi An. I waited ages to catch a bike passing across the far end.
It was a treacherous walk on a rainy afternoon to Nuoc Moc’s swimming hole, but our stomachs were full. We’d arrived at the nature walk of Nuoc Moc, between the Dark Cave and Paradise Cave, in the stunning Karst mountains of Phong Nha Ke Bang, to discover a typically gracious Vietnamese woman who offered us lunch. We agreed and were treated to a plate of steamed broken rice topped with fried chicken, tofu, delicious string beans, and a fried egg. It’s a simple meal, but after liberal application of soy sauce and chili, it was delicious.
With full stomach’s, we accepted that the light drizzle was not going to let up. We donned our rain gear, waterproofed our bags and set off to visit the Nuoc Moc swimming hole. To get there, you have to cross a number of fast flowing rivers via rickety bamboo bridges like the one you can see below. The rain made them slippery, but they seemed sturdy enough that if you wound up in the water it would be entirely due to operator error.
On the way back I asked my travel buddy to take a picture as I carried my gear across. She walked up to where I stood on the bridge to take my Iphone, photo mode ready. However, you’ll notice there’s no picture of me tentatively carrying my gear across a slippery, bamboo bridge. That’s because, when she reached me, the bridge decided to drop what felt like meters, but was probably more like inches. This warning was well heeded and, after freezing in shock briefly, we removed ourselves from the structure at great haste.
Even under a gloomy grey sky, the Ponte Vecchio is still worth a look.
