Day Nine

DAY NINE

We woke early and after breakfast we left for Italy. We originally planned to camp in the Dolomite Mountains on the way to Venice Italy and then proceed to Venice tomorrow morning. The road we travelled on today has to have been one of the most beautiful routes yet. The mountain passes that we ascended and descended during the course of the drive were spectacular. We first drove through the Italian Alps and went through numerous villages along the way. We then arrived in our planned campsite area at around 11.00am only to find that the campsite we had chosen was in yet another skiing village and not the dolomite mountains as we had planned. We decided to press on towards Venice and started our climb into this new uncharted territory. The mountain passes and scenery were awesome and the one pass that we climbed reached a height of 2192m. I have never seen Glenn so giddy like a school kid before. He got so excited at the prospect of taking photos that he lept from the car at the viewing point and proceeded to through “Lorraine – the GPS” out of the car into the ice. She seems to be recovering but I am still convinced that she must have taken quite a blow to the head since she seems to be getting rather confused of late.

We noticed a dramatic change in the buildings as soon as we crossed over from Austria to Italy. The buildings in Austria are quaint and extremely ornately decorated whilst the Italian buildings are simply functional. The snow capped mountains of Italy are just the same as those in Austria and besides the architecture of the region, you would have thought you were in Austria all the way down to within 80 Kms of Venice. We arrived at the campsite near Venice that is right on the shores of the Med and within eyesight of Venice. The campsite is very well situated and seems to be the perfect place to stay. We then decided to find a restaurant to grab an early dinner. The nightmare that ensued with undoubtedly the worst drivers in the world – SA taxi drivers included, was more than epic. The roads around the shores are full of traffic circles and the Italian Truck drivers drive like lunatics and cut in and out of the lanes without warning. Needless to say once we had driven around for more than an hour trying to find an open restaurant, it dawned on me that perhaps they only opened at 6.00pm and sure enough I was right. We are parked outside an Italian pizzeria at the moment waiting for it to open so that we can get some dinner before returning to the campsite for a well earned sleep.

We hope to sleep in late tomorrow and start making plans for our exploration of Venice in the morning.