Rocky beaches, funny legends and gondolas...

So my weekend was pretty much amazing!
We left early Friday morning and headed to Garda Lake, the biggest lake in Italy. We made it to a little town called Sirmione (which is not pronounced like Hermione, but I liked to say it like that anyway! haha) It was a beautiful village on the coast of Garda Lake! We went and found the beaches and had a fun time playing and sunning and eating. The beaches were not so much sandy as they were rocky. There were huge rocks all along the shore and into the water that you basically had to jump from rock to rock to make it into the water. You could be swimming in water that you couldn't even see the bottom and then just come upon a rock that you can stand up out of the water! It was so pretty and fun! I did prove my clumsiness as usual and came out with scraped knees from trying to re-inact a scene from Little Mermaid (I couldn't resist the huge rocks rising out of the water!) Afterwards we threw on our clothes (which I only had my jeans because thats what I was wearing and my other stuff was on the bus, so I was pretty uncomfortable the rest of the day in a wet-seated jeans!) and then we took a ferry across the lake. The ferry took us to another wonderful little village on the coast of Garda Lake and we had some gelato then jumped on the bus to take us to our hotel.
As we pulled up our hotel looked like a slightly shady Motel 8...but once inside the actual grounds it was awesome! There were beautiful pathways lined with flowers and arches with honeysuckle growing! Our rooms were pretty basic, but there was a huge pool in the middle of all the buildings along with a bar and a restaurant. At night there was live music and it was pretty fun to just sit by the pool and hang out listening to Italians singing American music! It was obviously a very much European vacation spot, because we were the only Americans there (about 80 of us maybe) but it was really fun to people watch at the pool and try to figure out where people were from based on their speedos and accents.
Saturday we went to Verona! It was a pretty little town that has much more history than Romeo and Juliet. We had an awesome tour guide, Andrea (a man), who was full of fun-filled and interesting facts about the city! We visited the proposed sites of Romeo and Juliet's houses (which I still loved even though I know it is fiction and they just randomly declared these places their houses for tourists) and also Dante's sqaure and saw where he probably wrote his Divine Comedy. It was really cool!! In that square there is a statue that legend says if an honest person walks under the archway it is above the statue will drop the ball it is holding...obviously the ball has never dropped so apparantly nobody in Verona is honest! I thought it was a pretty depressing legend! haha At "Juliet's house" I took pictures of her balcony and with the statue of her in the garden. Again, "legend" (which isnt as much of a legend, because the statue is only like 30 years old and was just put there after the movie, and is a TOTAL touristy made up thing) says that if you touch Juliet's left breast 3 times then you will always be happy in love...so yes, I have a picture of me doing that! Hey, I don't want to take any chances when it comes to love! haha We continued around the city and had some free time to do some shopping. I had some delicious limone granite (basically shaved ice) and then headed back to the buses. On the way out of town we walked past a Delorian convention of sorts. (Delorian= the car from Back to the Future!) There were about 30 of them just lined up and a few had their doors up! I got prettty excited...and took pictures.
We went to an amazing winery that afteroon. It is in a very famous wine valley of Northern Italy, Valpolicella. We went up to a little village overlooking the valley and got to go inside a 900 year old church. The church was all stone and still had flowers leftover from a wedding that made the whole place smell very fragrant. It was so peaceful and pretty there! There werent many people in the village and everything was just so calm and wonderful! The actual winery was so cool!! I felt like I was at Willy Wonka's, only with wine. They make Campagnola wine and they make a lot of it. We saw all the different rooms and the process and then we got to do a wine tasting! Our tour guide led us step by step of looking at the color, then smelling it, then tasting it. Soo fun! I wrote down the kind that I liked so I can buy some for everyone when I get home! (Because I asked if they sold it in the States and they do! I'm a little nervous about getting a bottle of wine home in my checked luggage...)
That night we had dinner at the hotel and it was delicious! We went back into a little village that night to just hang out and have fun...and we did! My friends and I were wandering the streets and came to the marina where there was this live music and a new wine launch. There were big tents and lots of people. We checked it out and got a glass of their yummy peach wine. The best part about this purchase was that the wine glass came in a little pouch that you can wear around your neck! Hands free wine night...haha I dubbed the contraption a "wine bib" and we took lots of fun pictures of us enjoying the practicality of the necklace-o-wine. Fun times.
Sunday we went to Venice and I absolutely loved it! It is such a unusual city and it really is amazing! I think the U.S. needs more all pedestrian cities! We got a tour and again saw many fascinating and historical sights, (my favorite was St. Mark's Sqaure...gorgeous!) We had a great lunch in the city and I had a really light pasta with olive oil, garlic, and chili pepper with a side of baby artichokes marinated in olive oil! YUM. The obvious highlight of my day, my weekend, the week, maybe one of the highlights of my trip so far, was our GONDOLA RIDE!! I was so excited and the 6 of us (Beth, Caitlin, Jean, Anna Margaret and Ann Hughston) split the cost and had a wonderful 30 minute-ish ride! Our gondaleer's name was Massimo and he was a slightly jaded Italian man who was very nice and friendly, but very honest about his city and his job. I told him I loved Venice and thought it was beautiful and he said "Not as beautiful as it used to be...it is like a Disneyland now." I asked how long he had been a gondaleer and if he liked it and he said "I have done this for 18 years...it is my job...I must like it." Pretty funny, but I still loved every second of the ride! After the ride we went shopping and I got lots of fun things!
The whole weekend was quite warm, but totally awesome weather! It was supposed to rain all weekend and the forecast was quite wrong...I got sunburned basically every day (even though I did wear sunscreen, we were just outside ALL day every day and it was HOT.)
This probably was one of my favorite weekends so far and I took TONS of pictures! I will try to get some up of the weekend soon!!