The Great Gigolo Hunt of 2007, Part 3A

Day Three—October 2, 2007

…I think I woke up with a slight hangover. Just a slight one. Since, you know, I don’t drink, and so the Hangover is a concept that is alien to me.

Sure I’m supposed to feel headachy and pukey and all, right? I mean, Rome did have vomitoria back in the day, right? Even though no actual vomiting took place there…go fig…

And to top things off we had to wake up on the early side yet again in order to hit the humongous breakfast buffet before starting our 7 hour drive up to Venice. Because there wouldn’t be many opportunities for noshing on the road, because food was verboten on the bus (although there were some naughty folk who did eat…and even leave their trash behind…I tell you, today’s seniors just are so irresponsible).

Now, normally I don’t have any problem with motion sickness, but I tell you I really wasn’t feeling too spiffy by the time we hit our first rest stop. Oh, my poor aching head. And apparently plain old aspirin can’t be sold over the counter (or at least I couldn’t find any at the place we stopped…but my Mom, ever prepared, had some stuck in one of her overstuffed bags). About all I could do was grab a few jugs of Gatorade and try to sleep it off.

I did doze a bit on the ride. Nevertheless, I did wake up every so often to get a look at the Italian highway system and snippets of the countryside that could be seen from the highway. But…I’ve seen a lot of countryside during countless trips along I-5 between San Francisco and Los Angeles, so I know what agriculture looks like. At any rate, by the time we reached our next rest stop for lunch (at a kind of combination self-service food bar/fast food/souvenir stand/gas station) my head no longer felt like a smooshed spicy meatball. It wasn’t a long stopover, maybe about 50 minutes or so, and since this stop would also have to include a trip to visit the line in the ladies room we just grabbed a pizza and fries and a “Coke Lite” (well, the fries came with the pizza combo). I also managed to slip in a quick call to my Bitter Half to see how the fort was holding up, and of course my Mom had to let him know I was a drunken lout the night before…thanks, Mom. I denied this, even though I did refer to the section of highway known as the “loop of Bologna” (which we had just passed before making our rest stop) as the “ring of Baloney.” Guess my brain still wasn’t quite up to speed (then again, those who know me say this kind of thinking is normal for me).

Well, back on the bus.

Since the entire bus ride would take roughly 7 hours, at some point Antonella our tour guide brought out the spiel about what optional tour excursions would be available (as well as the prices). As this vacation was basically for my Mom’s 55^th birthday (still about a month away at that point, but probably a lot closer than she’d care to think about), we decided to do the whole shebang. Otherwise, we’d probably be wandering around not knowing where to look next. Besides, this arrangement would also take our dinner plans into account, and rather than fuss with the local McDonald’s we figured this would be a much better way to go. So, if you’re going on a guided tour to begin with, you might as well go all the way.

At one point in the drive, we crossed the Po River, the longest river in Italy despite its itty bitty name (and, yes, there is a lame Teletubbies joke in there, somewhere behind the hangover haze).

But, soon enough, we neared Venice. Venezia, the city made up of several small islands bunched up together and bobbing on the Venetian Lagoon. Venice is really the reason my Mom wanted to visit Italy to begin with, but I had no heart to tell her just what the Venetian Lagoon is. Our hotel was on the mainland (most Venetians live on the mainland rather than the canal-riddled sections), and we had just enough time to stretch out briefly before heading down for the Dreaded Authentic Venetian Gondola Ride…

Only two photos this time, so grab ‘em while they’re hot.