My White Christmas attempt

[VPS]

Possibly the ugliest nativity scene ever









At the FRZ bar

 

[VPS]

The next day a bit more wandering around and then walked to the train station to catch the slow train to Bolzano.

There were a large number of trees on either side which we eventually worked out were apples – the trellising of I presume vines was really interesting

So off to Bolzano for four nights– this time our apartment wasn’t that great.

https://www.airbnb.com.au/rooms/5011197 - we booked it through Booking.com but I notice their website says you can’t book it through them anymore.

The bedrooms were upstairs and the bathroom downstairs and the stairs was a quite rickety spiral staircase. Everything downstairs was quite grubby and the kitchen was poorly designed and equipped.

Apart from the state of the apartment the location was great – there was a fruit and veg store across the road, a baker and butcher and supermarket all within 200 metres and the baker was doing such a roaring trade that there was often a queue out the door.

We stayed in the old part of Bolzano which wasn’t huge but lots of lovely streets and old buildings – I’m not much of a shopper but enjoy just strolling along and taking in the atmosphere.

Bolzano has a large Christmas Market in the main square which had a wide variety of goods – not as good as the one I went to in Basel a few years ago but very good nonetheless.

Not great photos from the train
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Apples
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The view from my bedroom window

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The bakery two doors down from the apartment
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Lots of narrow streets and there were many lane ways and arcades going from street to street


One of the lane ways - they obviously don't want dogs in there



Chocolate stalls at the market -lots of them and the detail was amazing

 

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Check out that blue sky

 

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Christmas market



Love the Italian tradition of nibbles with drinks

 

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We visited the Otzi museum http://www.iceman.it/en/ - the whole museum was built just to house Otzi and the story – I really enjoyed it and all the info about what happens if they get a power failure or there’s any problems with the building – the fire brigade and ambulance have to pack him up and take him and keep him at a certain temperature and humidity.

 

[RB]

Thanks for the write-up. Have been through Bolzano a few times arriving by train & then straight out to the Dolomites so good to see some detail

 

[VPS]

There have a been a few comments about wanting to see the snow but the astute will note that my TR is called my White Christmas attempt (note not success)

Christmas Day arrived and not a flake of snow to be seen anywhere except on the very top of very very distant mountains.I’d been watching the webcam of where we were going for Christmas lunch and a couple of weeks before Christmas there was quite a lot of snow. Our webcam

There is a cable car that goes from Bolzano up to the Gasthof but unfortunately it wasn’t working the Christmas week so we had to find a taxi to take us up and they wouldn’t let us book one but assured us that we would find plenty at the station on Christmas Day. Its 5 minutes on the cable car but a 20 minute 35 euro taxi ride but what the heck.

BUT – the food and the view made up for it – it was a great meal, the service was excellent and I thought it was very good value for what it was – we all came home afterwards and had a nap and didn’t eat anything else for the rest of the day.

Some photos at the top

 

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More of the yummy food

 

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The service was excellent and your menu was printed in your language - there was a mixture of Italian, English and Austrian/German

 

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The next day we caught the cable car up to Renon/Ritten – they go very frequently and only takes 12 minutes to the top. Cable Car - In 12 minutes from Bolzano to the sunny high plateau

Then you can take the train to Soprabolzano

Views from the cable car so hard to get good shots

 

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The little train up to Soprabolzano



Each of the railway stations were decorated differently




I think there may have been just a teeny bit of snow here

 

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Even the service stations look charming



The new train - they alternate the old and the new - and they are run by SAD (sad acronym)



Lovely church





Main station

 

[VPS]

So my White Christmas attempt was a dismal failure but I had a wonderful time and it just means that I have to try again sometime - we were going to go further up into the mountains but when we booked in July one of my friends had just had a stroke and we weren't sure how she'd recover so decided against going anywhere too remote

The next day my friends went back to London and I'm off to Venice - to be continued.....

 

[JessicaTam]

So my White Christmas attempt was a dismal failure but I had a wonderful time and it just means that I have to try again sometime - we were going to go further up into the mountains but when we booked in July one of my friends had just had a stroke and we weren't sure how she'd recover so decided against going anywhere too remote

The next day my friends went back to London and I'm off to Venice - to be continued.....

But I enjoyed coming along for the ride.

 

[VPS]

But I enjoyed coming along for the ride.

Thank you and the ride isn't over yet

 

[VPS]

The trains are efficient and I don't think expensive. I arrived at Santa Lucia on time. I found the toilets in and around Venice are expensive – at least 1 euro sometimes 1.5 euro and if you’re travelling alone it’s sometimes hard on trains – do you leave your luggage and hope it’s still there when you get back and risk fighting with the travel insurance because you didn’t keep sight of your luggage at all times.

I caught the vaporetto from the station to the hotel. I think it is 7.5 euro for a single trip or a couple of stops but you can get 2 days unlimited for 30 euro or 3 days for 40 euro. There’s a ticket office just outside the train station and the queues for staffed windows were huge but I just walked up to the self-serve machine and bought one with my credit card.

I stayed at the Hotel Colombina Hotel Colombina in Venice - Book a Luxury hotel near St. Mark's Square in the Locanda Remedio room at the back of the hotel. It was in a great location – only 100 metres to St Mark’s Square but very quiet. The room was OK and quite large but the bathroom could have done with a bit of a scrub and a refurb (and I do dislike showers over baths). The staff all spoke very good English and were all very friendly.

The hotel - there were some quite steep stairs up to the room and no lift. I found the room quite warm and even though I turned off the heating it was still warm – you could open the windows but there was a note on them warning you to keep them closed in summer because of the mosquitoes and one night I had one buzzing around my head for a few hours.

The shower is over the bath and even though there is a glass shield it was almost impossible not to flood the floor. The bath is quite high so you need to be able to step up to get into the bath.

Breakfast was included and there was quite a variety of cereals, cold meat, pastries, yoghurt, fruit and hot eggs and bacon.

The bed was comfortable and there were plenty of pillows. The room was spacious and well laid out but it was all looking a bit tired – there were some frayed edges on the bed head. The shower and toilet were quite grubby when I got there and the board on the edge of the bath was coming away.

There were also some renovations happening while I was there so it was a bit of an obstacle course to get through the courtyard to my room.

 

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The hotel offered a 30 euro boat tour of the Grand Canal for 90 minutes – it was a small and private boat so we could go up some of the smaller canals and it was only for hotel guests and maximum of I think 12 people. It was OK but if you get an ACTV pass you can see most of this on the main vaporettos. The water was quite low so it was a bit of a struggle to get down to the boat.

I spent a couple of days just wandering around a getting lost – didn’t find google maps for walking in Venice very useful. It was great to be back a couple of streets from the canals and just wander around and I saw some beautiful buildings and after a while you almost stopping taking photos because everything is just so interesting. I visited the Peggy Guggenheim Museum which I found excellent and there was a Tancredi exhibition on at the same time which I also enjoyed.

I’m a fan of the Donna Leon novels set in Venice so was looking for Commissario Brunetti getting into a vaporetto talking on his telefonino but sadly didn’t see anyone that resembled him.


Look at that blue sky

 

[VPS]

More Venice - I was really surprised how many people were there