Carnevale!

Where could you ride a water taxi, spray silly string and throw confetti, and not be judged on the ridiculous mask you’re wearing? In Venice!

Carnevale was this past weekend, and we knew from the start that we wanted to go. It was quite the process getting there (5am wakeup, 6:40 train to Florence, another three hour bus ride to Venice, not returning to Florence until 3am) but the experience was more than worth the trek.

I was surprisingly excited at the prospect of being able to look like a complete idiot. Mission accomplished. When we arrived, I bought a beautifully decorated mask with a giant red feather and lots of glitter. It wasn’t a cheap flimsy mask; these are made to last!

My two friends and I decided to start off our day by going to Murano, one of Venice’s islands. This island is known for glass-blowing, and has many shops devoted to stunning glass products. I can’t even explain how beautiful all of the pieces were. I can’t imagine the work that goes into each individual item. We were able to catch a bit of a demonstration (before we were told we had to pay 5 euro to watch the rest), and I picked up a gift for my mom and myself! I bought a really pretty blue glass ring. It's hard to describe, but I'll have to post a picture.

The water taxis were the coolest! Venice is a city on islands essentially. There are no roads in the normal sense of the word. The “roads” in Venice are waterways. I am not sure if I would want to have to take a boat to get to my front door, but that’s what makes this city so fabulously unique! The water taxis that we took around the city are boats that act like buses. There are actually “boat stops” at different points! The boat pulls up to the dock (or “stop”) and lets people on and off before continuing. Our route from the city center to Murano took about an hour, but the boat ride was half the fun!

In the early evening, we made our way back to Piazza San Marco (Venice's famous main square) . It was CRAZY in the best sense of the word. People were throwing confetti around spraying silly string. Carnevale is kind of like the Italian version of Halloween, but still so different. Some people spend an incredible amount of money on elaborate costumes. There are tons of invitation-only balls as well (we weren't invited...darn). Here are some of the interesting people we ran into:

Random Italians jumped in...I think one of them was Willy Wonka

These lovely group of Italians deserves special mention: the flip-flops! The were hilarious. They kept wrapping each other in tape. We chatted them up. Apparently last year they dressed as air fresheners, and the year before they were dice! 

And the magical boat ride back. Bye Venice!