Carnevale!

Most of the CIMBA students headed into Venice sometime this weekend to experience Carnevale. I decided to just make it a day trip on Sunday with a couple friends so I could avoid spending excess money on hotel rooms. We looked up the schedule of events to see what free things we could attend (just do a Google search) and got in to Venice around 10:30. It was much easier to get around this time…just follow the flow of traffic!

We made our way to Piazza San Marco to see the Angel Flight (Volo dell’Angelo) and as we went over the Rialto Bridge we caught the Festa Veneziana, which was a parade in the Grand Canal. The closer we got to San Marco the more and more crowded it got. We made our way to the very center of the Piazza (stupid idea #1) because we wanted to get a good photo. We thought the Angel Flight would be more like a zipline from the tower to the ground but instead she was very slowly lowered to the ground on the cable.

We were standing shoulder to shoulder, front to back, with all of the thousands of people in the Piazza and apparently everyone decided it was a good idea to leave at the same time (stupid idea #2). The police had blocked off some of the small alleys (for some reason) so ALL of us needed to get out of only two exits on opposite sides of the Piazza. When a crowd that large tries to fit into a six-foot wide opening, it goes quite slowly. The people behind us did not understand this concept. They thought that if you just push on the person in front of you then everything moves faster (stupid idea #3). So with everyone in back of us doing this same thing, we had no choice but to also push on the person in front of us. Basically it ended up with an entire crowd leaning at a 20 degree angle not accomplishing anything and everyone in pain…yet they kept doing it. We tried to keep our group of three linked together but the more uncomfortable people get the ruder they are so we ended up losing one girl for awhile. Luckily she could still see the hat of the guy with us and kept track of it so she found us eventually.

To save money, our plan was to eat a huge lunch and have a pastry just before we left Venice (stupid idea #4). We did some souvenir shopping and then ate lunch at a pizzeria. Then we made our way back to Piazza San Marco (we are suckers for punishment I guess) to see the Period Costume Festival. After taking pictures with plenty of costumed people, we decided we’d had enough (good idea #1!).

We followed another flow of traffic back out to the train station, bought our tickets, and went to the platform the sign told us to go to. Take note: sometimes the signs in train stations LIE! The platform next to ours said Bassano del Grappa, which was where we needed to get to. We saw a few of our professors headed that way so we figured we might as well join them. Our professors are really great people. After comparing souvinirs and chatting about the day’s events, the train finally took off (no train ever showed up on the platform we had been told to go to). For some reason on the trip back to Bassano, they do not make announcements about stops over the intercom so we actually had to pay attention to signs. Luckily we did get off at the right stop and we managed to find the bus to Crespano and buy tickets minutes before it left.

Take note: on Sundays the local bus does not come through Paderno. It will take you as far as the nearby town of Crespano and the bus does not run as frequently or as late. Plan accordingly! Because Crespano was as close as we could get, we had to hike our exhausted bodies back up the hill to Paderno. Remember our plan to only have that one meal that day? This is where we started to regret it. The cafeteria had closed by the time we got back and we did not want to spend any more money eating out. I had saltines, twizzlers, and a can of Sprite for dinner. Mmm, healthy!