Chioggia -> Paris

Captain and First Mate

We're up at 07:00 to pack our bags and tidy things up. We have to give the boat back between 08:00 and 09:00. I assume there will be an inspection first, and some papers to sign. Food is running low, so it's tea and nutella on bread for breakfast. Then squash everything into our suitcases, wash the dishes, take out the garbage, sweep the floor. Just before 09:00 I take the suitcases and put them out on the pontoon behind the boat. 

A few minutes later a man comes and says "don't worry, this won't take long". He takes a quick look over the boat, asks if we had any problems, and mentions that we're one towel short. Eileen tells him that we didn't need the fourth towel and it's in a locker in the aft cabin. Then we sign a paper and that's it. We had taken the "pack tranquilité" which includes fuel, insurance waiver, and boat cleaning so I think that also makes for a quicker return procedure. Also the fact that we didn't break anything, lose anything, run aground, crash the boat, or sink!

We say goodbye, pick up our suitcases, and start walking across the bridge towards Sottomarina and the bus station. Thankfully the rain has stopped, and we find the station easily. I go up to the desk and ask for 3 tickets to Padova. The lady says "ok, but hurry because the bus is there and it's about to leave!". We get our tickets and run for the bus. 

The bus takes us back through Sottomarina, past the long sandy beaches, and then winds around into Chioggia from the other side. Then back out and across a very long bridge over swampy lagoon and onto the mainland. From the bridge we can see the ship that passed us as we came into Chioggia! We motor along through the countryside and once again we see many fields covered in bright red poppies. Eileen tries to take a picture with her phone, but hits the shutter button just as we pass a tree. Later we'll be wondering why she took a picture of that tree? I don't bother taking out the iPad.

Soon we arrive in Padova, and first priority is to get train tickets for Bologna. There is a train leaving in 4 minutes and we'll never make that so we get the next one which gives us an hour to kill. As we're getting our tickets (from a machine) we hear what sounds like a marching band playing. We look around, trying to see where the music is coming from, inside the station? Outside? Eventually we trace it to a group of people wearing Bavarian hats and giving an impromptu concert of oom-pa-pa music on the quay. They all have suitcases and must be returning to Germany. They've attracted quite a crowd and get a big round of applause. 

There's a nice looking café there in the station so we stop for a coffee and buy some sandwiches to take with us on the train. Laura buys a small tin of Pringles. Why do kids love every horrible manufactured sickly-sweet salty artificially flavoured plastic wrapped imitation food product, and hate anything that's natural and good for you? Seems like a strange genealogical trait. Must be advertising. I have to admit they taste pretty good though...

The train is about to arrive so we take our bags and head for the quay. This time we're in the same car, but still not seated together. We arrive in Bologna Centrale and head straight for the BLQ coach to the airport. We're just in time, a coach is waiting at the stop. I must admit I was a bit stressed out about all the bus/train/coach connections that we have to make our flight, but everything seems to be going smoothly and we should be at the airport in good time.

We arrive at the airport and the bus stops, but it's not the usual stop. There is a bit of confusion as people start getting off (including Eileen!). There is a small sign that says "East Terminal" or something like that so I tell Eileen to get back on before the door closes! Several other people get back on the bus as well. A few minutes later we arrive at the usual stop in front of the airport. There is a lot of construction work going on here, so it's a bit difficult to figure out where to go. Finally we check in ourselves (with a machine) and check in our bags (with a human). 

Bosun hard at work, and well supervised!

We've got about an hour to kill before our flight, so we want to get through security and have a look around the duty-free shop. As usual there is a huge line to go through security, and while we are queuing I remind Eileen of the time we came through here with my mom on the way back from Riccione. It was the first time she had flown since they brought in the restrictions on taking liquids on board, and she wasn't aware of them. It hadn't even occurred to me to tell her, and of course she had loads of liquids and creams in her carry-on bag. These were expensive items and there was no way she was going to leave them behind. So we had to run back to the check-in desk and check through her carry-on bag after transferring some of the stuff to a plastic bag and my backpack. Then run back to security, get rushed through and onto the plane.

I'm chuckling about that when suddenly I freeze. It just hit me that I have a bottle of limoncello in my backpack! Oh no, how could I have been so stupid! Eileen picked up this bottle to take back with us in a supermarket, and the bottle has an unusual shape with a long thin neck. I was afraid it would break in the suitcase, so I packed it carefully into my backpack. Sh!t. What do I do now?

When we get to the x-ray scanner I tell the security guy that I have a bottle of limoncello in my backpack. I show it to him, explaining that it's still sealed so it should be no problem, right? "Impossible". But, but it... "Sorry". But... "No". He tells me to put the bottle on the tray with my backpack and put it all through the scanner.

"Is this your bag?". Yes. The scanner guy says to the security guy that he sees liquids. The security guy says "Yes, there is a bottle of limoncello". The scanner guy says "No, there is something else". What are you talking about? There isn't anything else! The security guy starts rifling through my backpack and suddenly pulls out a jar of lemon marmalade. NO! Not my marmellata di limoni?!!! 

The day we arrived we went shopping for some basic groceries, and I spotted this jar of "traditional made in Italy authentic lemon marmalade" so I thought it might be interesting to try it. I liked it so much that I bought another jar to take home with us. But surely a jar of marmalade is not considered a liquid? "Sorry, you can't take it". Carp. I can either go back and check them through in my backpack, or leave them behind. Knowing they will break in my backpack, I reluctantly leave them behind. 

We head for the boarding gates, and it's not looking good when we see lots of construction work and no duty-free. There is a café so we console ourselves with a coffee. When we finish the coffee we still have a bit of time so we stroll around and suddenly we see this huge duty-free around the other side of the security area. We head over there, and they have everything: limoncello made with Amalfi lemons, marmellata di limoni, squid-ink pasta, vin santo, biscotti, salami! Woohoo! 

We arrive back in Paris, and it's a bit hard to adjust to normal life again. It doesn't feel like we were only away for a week. Feels more like a month. Eileen comes back from the bakery with a lemon cake instead of usual pain au chocolat or chausson au pomme. "Just for a change", she says. The Eurovision song contest  is on, so we watch it while sampling our vin santo and biscotti. 

Post scriptum
I'm dying to see the video from Bacino San Marco, where Eileen was driving the boat through all that crazy traffic. I take out the iPad and go straight for the video, but it's not there. Thinking I must be looking in the wrong place, I start clicking around, but I can't find it anywhere. Back to the video section, and there is just a brief one second clip showing the dashboard of the boat. I remember at the time, it was the first time I had used the iPad as a video camera and I hit the start-stop button quickly to make sure it was working. Then I hit start and videoed for a good 5 minutes. But I guess I missed the start button because the boat was bouncing around, and the video wasn't actually recording. Aaarrrggghhh!!!! 

Another lesson learnt the hard way. Practice using your new stuff before you need it for real. At least the photos I took with the iPad came out, but in general the quality is really bad compared to my old Canon digital camera. Dirty lens, wrong settings? Not sure but I'm surprised how bad they look.

Rowing in the lagoon

Looking back on our holiday, one thing really strikes me. I don't think you can appreciate just how fragile Venice is without having visited the lagoon. People didn't come to live here by choice, they came to flee the invading barbarians after the fall of the Roman Empire. They left their fertile lands to live on tiny, water-logged islands in the middle of a lagoon. That they were able to prosper and leave us the incredible heritage that is Venice today is a magnificent tribute to their ingenuity and perseverance. A World Heritage Site if ever there was one.