Public Transportation

THE OTHER DAY I was sitting on the commuter train minding my own business when a 20-something male plopped down on a chair directly across from me.  He placed his bookbag on the seat next to him.  He unzipped it and pulled out two giant plastic rubber gloves, like the kind you might see a cleaning lady wear. He carefully stretched them over both hands...and then, extremely slowly and deliberately, he used his right gloved hand to gently lift open the trash receptacle below the window next to our seat.  His approach was so cautious that it was almost as if he expected a horrifying creature to jump out at him.  He lifted the lid only a centimeter or so - wincing sideways as he did, and then suddenly, as if satisfied it did not contain said creature, flipped it close, took of his gloves, and then promptly got comfortable and went to sleep. 

Public transportation has its idiosyncrasies.  That's actually a part of the commuter train experience I look forward to - the Train Culture.  And as I look back, it seems like our children have had plenty of opportunities to experience that too.  I was looking through our photos not too long ago and was surprised to see how much we've experienced.  

Waiting for a regional train in France. 

A day's worth of subway tickets in Paris. 

Camden checks out the sign and the board (not pictured) at an U-bahn (Subway) stop in Berlin. 

A Subway zooms buy....I am honestly not entirely sure where, I think also Berlin. 

Waiting for an Italian regional train to take us to Ostia Antica in southern Italy. 

First in line for a Vaparetto - a Venician water taxi - in a late evening tour of Venice.  

A glass-covered Water Taxi in Berlin on the Spree river.  It was so hot inside of that glass Tylenol pill....

Zooming along the causeway from Padua to Venice on an Italian regional train.  

The expansive Nation subway station in Paris.  

City XPress, and ironic name for a gondola ride to the top of a mountain in Austria. 

A toy explodes in a powdery white mess on an otherwise pristine Roman subway.  

On a Deutsche Bahn short hop train to Deidesheim for the Christmas Market. 

Funicular!  Don't remember where, but it is fun to say Funicular! 

Horse and Carriage in the birthplace of Mozart - Salzburg

Frankfurt Flughafen, watching the 767 load up and waiting to board.  

Taking the ferry across the IJ in Amsterdam. 

Waiting for the metro in Amsterdam's Central Station. 

Riding a cog train to the Mer de Glace in France

A large nearly vertical gondola in Chamonix, France

On the Ferry across the channel

The famous red double-decker busses of London (see the telephone booth?)

On "The Tube" in London, arguably the worlds most well known subway. 

Aboard the Renfe Spanish regional train

On the Barcelona metro. 

This is really just a sampling of the times when I had my camera handy.  It doesn't include the French TGV, or the Deutsche Bahn ICE trains, or the gritty public buses in Rome, or the time we were jammed into a French regional train and Jazzy screamed for mommy (who was crammed into a distant corner) for 20 minutes straight, or the time a bus broke down in Rome and we got kicked off and stranded, or the time I had to have Melissa and the kids come pick me up at a small town train station an hour away from our house because the track was suddenly and mysteriously closed.

Public transportation has its idiosyncrasies.

Venice by Day, Venice by Night

PERHAPS we made a bit of a tactical error when we decided it would probably work to stuff all of the kids in the car, drive all the way from Rome to Padua for 6 hours on the road, get unpacked, and then head right out to check out Venice around dusk.  I think we assumed it was a 20-minute train ride from Padua (because that is precisely what we were told) but the total commute ended up being more like two hours, broken down roughly as:

1. 8 minute ride to the train station
2. 8 minute ride back home because we forgot the camera
3. 8 minute ride back to the train station
4. 10 minutes figuring out how to buy the right tickets
5. 5 minutes walking to the track
6. 15 minutes to walk back to the station and find a bathroom for Camden
7. 10 minute wait for the train
8. 51 minute train ride into Venice.  

Here then, at last, was the view back to the mainland as the sun was setting over the causeway: 

The tiredness was setting in on all of us the minute we walked out of the train station, and to top it off, sometimes being a tourist means standing in long lines. In this case, we started our Venice tour with a 30 minute wait in the Vaparetto (water bus)  ticket line, only to find out the Vaparettos were striking in a few hours and for the rest of the day tomorrow.  So we splurged for a chance for a one-way ride down the main channel to Piazza San Marco.

And, allow me to state the obvious: Venice is beautiful at night.

Of course, it was beautiful.  It's hard to take a good picture at night riding on the back of a Vaparetto, but a few pics turned out good enough to capture the environment of Venice lit up.

We reached Piazza San Marco assuming the crowds would have cleared out and headed back to the main-land.  Boy were we wrong!  It was hopping!  Music, dancing, lots of ritzy people, and lots to see.

We then meandered through the back streets of Venice (without a map) searching for the train station where we started, stopping for supper and snacks along the way.

Here the kids spy a Morano glass store featuring lfe-like glass balloons. Good souvenir?  No...500€ per balloon.

Gelato!

Did I mention Venice is beautiful at night?

We got back to the apartment at about 11:30pm and bedded everyone down.  We slept in (it was needed).   Once we got moving the next morning, we boarded the kids back up onto the train with much more efficiency and headed back for more.

And allow me once again to state the obvious: Venice is beautiful by day.

Anna bought some Murano glass.

Where is a pleasant passing tourist who could take a family picture when we need one!?

 Venice is beautiful....but it requires a lot of walking (unless the water bus isn't on strike the ONE day of your life you plan to visit)... and like many sights in Italy we discovered it is not stroller-friendly (so many arched bridges with only stairs), which meant we had to keep constant watch and hold of Jazlynn all day.  That makes a long walk a gazillion times longer, even with Gelato stops in between.

Even so, it was worth it, and our family got to check another famous sight off our list.