Mastre Station is NOT Santa Lucia Station . . . and Italy's Version of Recycling

Hello!  Welcome to the second leg of my European Adventure.  On a side note, if you have not seen National Lampoon's European Vacation, definitely watch it.  Then, picture me and I'm sure you'll get lots of laughs.  :D

Vaughn and I successfully checked our luggage (both less than 20kg) and made it to the Marco Polo Airport in one piece.  We did have a little hiccup when it came to getting on the right coach to get to the Santa Lucia Station.  We boarded one coach bus thinking it was the right one, but realized that we purchased tickets for the Mastre Station.  So, we got off and waited for that coach bus instead.  When we arrived at the station, we activated our Eurorail passes and made reservations on the 13:27 train to Florence . . . from the Santa Lucia Station . . . which is not the station we were currently at.  After buying a map for 3 Euro, I found out that the Mastre station is actually on the mainline of Italy . . . NOT Venice.  We tried to buy tickets to Venice on the train, but no such luck.  Eventually, we decided to take a taxi.

The street our hotel is on is not accessible by cars, so I told the taxi driver to get us as close as possible.  He was very successful . . . he dropped us off at the stairs essentially next to our hotel.  We checked in and relaxed for about an hour . . . trying to figure out where to meet our tour guide for the Cicchetti of Venice tour that started at 5:30pm.  We left at 4:30pm and walked along the new street of Venice in amazement.  Everything here is simply beautiful.

We found the round church with roughly 20 minutes to spare so Vaughn and I enjoyed our first official taste of Italian Gelato.  Yum!  Our tour group consisted of a married couple from Seattle, a young therapist from Chicago, another married couple from Atlanta (we think), a brother and sister from England, and a set a parents and daughter from Australia.  It was a great group.  Our tour guide led us to 5 different places to experience Venice cusine (cicchetti) and different wines from the area.  We also had a quick trip across the Grand Canal.

We learned that recycling recently came to Italy . . . about 2 years ago.  The way Italians recycle their water bottles is to bring them to a wine place that will refill your water bottle with your choice of wine . . . 1.90 to 2.90 euro per liter.  We are pumped . . . I have two bottles just waiting for some sparkling red and white.  :)

Tomorrow we will be going to Saint Mark's Basilica before jumping on the train to Florence.  I'm still in awe that I'm in Italy.  On one more note, our hotel room's window faces one of the smaller canals.  We can hear the water lapping against the side.  I'm in heaven!