On our first night, Dash woke up a few times at night demanding to be fed. Other than that, he was a good boy.
His jet lag while we were in Italy was not bad. (It was a whole different story post-Italy, back at home . . . .) His sleep and feeding patterns adjusted within a few days in Italy, probably because we were out and about all day every day during the day.
Our friends had a pack-and-play in our room for Dash to sleep in. We tried putting him in it for sleep. But he kept yelling whenever we put him in it. So, of course, Dash got his way and happily slept with us on our bed, between Care Bear and I, the entire week we were in Italy. Dash wins.
On our second day in Italy, we had train tickets to go to Venice for an overnight trip. Before we left for Venice, we squeezed in some sight-seeings, at the Palatine Hill and the Roman Forum. Both were accessible with the same ticket we used to get into the Colosseum, which was good for two days.
First, we had breakfast from La Licata, a local cafe a few blocks from our friends’ place. Care Bear went there every morning to have breakfast with Adam, and every day he brought me back a pastry and a cappuccino. The pastries I had were decadent, like pistachio nutella croissant or chocolate twist.
Then we walked to Palatine Hill, or Palatino, which means palace in Italian. It is a five minute walk from the Colosseum.
The Palatine Hill is one of the oldest parts of Rome. It is considered where the Roman Empire started. It is believed to be where the cave of Romulus and Remus was before they were found by the wolf.
The Palatine Hill was very large and we had limited time, so we had to skip large parts of it. There were so much ruins and very little signs or posts explaining much of anything. I was shocked that there were marbles from floors that survived since around 500 B.C., but because there was so much of the marble that survived, some marbles were not roped off and you could step all over them. The same was true for a lot of the ruins. No signs, no explanation posters, and you could sit on them or walk on them.
The Palatine Hill was connected to the Roman Forum. The Roman Forum is a large plaza surrounded by important civic buildings. It is where public activities took place. Julius Caesar walked on those same stones that we walked on.
We took a cab back to the apartment to pick up our luggage, then went to the Rome train station. We had some spare time at the train station, so we picked up some sandwiches for lunch to eat on the train. We got on the train and enjoyed the view of rural Italy for four hours. The train was clean and modern. Dash slept on sabba’s shoulders for the entire four hours. Jet lag.
Once we arrived in Venice, we took a ferry shuttle to our hotel. It was a 25 minute ride and it was lovely. Dash demanded to be fed when we got on the ferry, so I fed him standing up, on a rocking ferry trying to balance, squeezed among many people. Gotta be efficient with precious time and feed him on the go whenever we have down time.
Our hotel was a short walk from the ferry station. It was a lovely hotel! We had the suite room, with two King size beds and a ginormous bathroom.
We rested in our hotel room for a little bit. Then we left to go sightsee. We walked to the San Marco Square. There were many people in extravagant costumes for Mardi Gras Tuesday.
I was so excited we made it to this beautiful, famous square, a second time around for me, with my husband and my baby! It was an unbelievable, surreal feeling being there, with my new family, reminiscing back to the last time I was there when I was a teenager.
We went into a cafe around the square, but it was so expensive, so we left. It was worth having gone inside though, because we got to see people in extravagant costumes, waiters in tuxedo, and awesome Parisian-style decorations.
Then we walked around the square. We stopped by a bakery to have a puff pastry. We went into shops and bought some souvenirs.
Then we went to get what would become my favorite meal in Italy, dinner at Osteria da Carla. It was a small place–it could seat about 20 people. We had an olive oil tasting, where they gave us three different types of olive oil from different local places, one of which had a spicy taste. We also had a cheese plate, which came with a sweet onion jam, which I never had before. I liked it. It had a spicy kick. Then I had black squid ink pasta, which is one of my favorite dishes in my life, which was served with salty roe. Amazing.
After dinner, we slowly made our way back to the hotel, looking at different sights and stores. We rested a bit in our hotel room. Then we went to check out the nightlife in Venice.
We walked to a University area. And, what do you know, there was an EDM party in the open air going on in a plaza. There was a big crowd at the party and at the bars and restaurants in the streets surrounding the plaza. It was a fun sight to see. The DJ’s name was DJ Peter Pan.
It was such a fun night walking through the beautiful, narrow streets, laced with big and small canals, navigating the foggy labyrinth with loud, fun-seeking Venetian (or back-packing or tourist) party-goers. Day 1 in Venice a success.
ALIEN TO AMERICAN 