Saturday, must be Venice!

A 13 hour flight that really doesn't rate describing other than mentioning that Air New Zealand are MUCH better than Swiss Air, so there. We went through European customs when we transferred at Zurich (a handy thing to do when your connecting flight leaves in 45 mins), so we got off the Fokker 100, leaving the less than chipper flight crew behind, and straight into lingua italia! Va bene!

Tickets purchased for the water bus, we head out to the grey, drizzly, early morning. Around 7 degrees.

The apartment we've rented is in the Canneregio Sestiere so we got off at the Fondemente Nuovo stop and trundled our luggage through alleyways and bridges to the address given. 

Signora Trez was indeed at the top of the stairs to give us the keys as per instx, and between my travelers' Italian and Anne's, we got everything sorted.

The apartment is compact, very warm (typical kiwis turned all the heaters off and opened the windows immediately) and next to a canal — with canal works, surprise! No matter, I hear there are other picturesque ones somewhere near here....

There's a church nearby that rings bells on the hour and half hour – same number for the half hour but with a tinny smaller bell denoting the half – 70's English comedians have a lot to answer for as I visualize Eric Morecambe ringing the sonorous main bell and Ernie Wise striking a tin pot with a wooden spoon...

So! We're in Ven— zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz