Day 84 (Venice, Italy) – Whoa it’s hot

I’m in Italy!  And it’s HOT!  My hostel/hotel I was staying at had its reception right next to the train station which is where I thought I was staying.  The lady at the desk corrected my error and told me I need to just walk a short way across four bridges and I would find my room no problem.  The walk really wasn’t that long at all but it was probably close to 40 C°(Sorry, I’ve given up on converting temperatures now) outside.  But I would quickly get used to it because it wasn’t going to warm up at all and I would have to do a lot of walking since there was no motorized traffic allowed in Venice.

Once I showered and cooled off a bit I took a stroll around Venice.  It really is exactly what you expect – gorgeous.  There might be a lot of tourists, especially now in the high season, but I still loved how refreshing it was to walk around an entire city without hearing or seeing any cars, busses, motorcycles, etc..   

I headed over to St. Marks Square (the main site to see) and was taken back by all the pigeons there.  There are thousands of them.  And there are actual street venders selling pigeon seed to feed them.  Why would they encourage these flying rats is something I don’t understand.  But it was sort of neat seeing all the kids running around chasing after them.  The birds were so accustomed to being fed that you could put some of the feed in your hands and they would fly up and sit on your arm to eat it.  I don’t know about you but I’m not that interested in having an animal sit on my arm that seems to crap uncontrollably.  I guess some people enjoy that sort of thing though.