An entry in the TFS Travel Journal.
It must be noted that today was the first day of the trip that Milton slept later than Wendy. We walked to the old Jewish ghetto (there are now only 500 Jews in Venice; about 30 of them live presently in the ghetto), which looks like other piazzas, but a bit more enclosed.
Unfortunately, the museum is only open for tours - the next one was at 11:30 - and we didn’t have the time since Avis closed for the day at 1pm . We did see a shop nearby where a man made beautiful handpainted glass items - kiddush cups, plates, etc. - however, there was a 10-month waiting list, and his prices were a bit daunting, but we did very much enjoy his art.
We attempted to walk quickly and efficiently back to the hotel (really asking for trouble in Venice) and, for the first time, got completely misdirected. Finally figured out where we were (at the train station) and just hopped the vaporetto home. We checked out, took the water taxi, got a porter for our luggage, and got the car in time from Avis — all those land and sea connections without a hitch; seemed too good to be true.
We motored off to Treviso, Italy for lunch, about 30 minutes away. Got to Centro, but couldn’t find the Fred restaurant we had a reservation at. We bought a map, but that didn’t help, so we asked a few people until we found one who spoke enough english and knew the town. He said it was too hard to explain how to get there, and as it was getting very close to the 2 pm witching hour, we just asked him for a recommendation nearby. While we were talking to him, a few people helpfully pointed out that smoke was coming from under our hood. We then parked and set off for food. We had difficulty finding the place, but we finally did and it was closed. We just walked on until finding an open place which turned out to be not so bad. The pastas were best: a penne bolognese and a spectacular penne w/salmon and a light cream sauce. Entrees were a grilled veal chop (ok, but plain) and the lightly fried mixed seafood. The espresso was quite good as was the house red wine.
We then walked the town of Treviso, Italy which was mostly closed and seemed to be nothing we hadn’t seen. We did have probably the best coconut gelato of the trip, though. We then saw a show taking place in the central piazza which we pieced together was honoring/showcasing kids from the local performing arts high school. The bit we saw, though, consisted of disco-type music with weirdly-dressed kids parading up and down a makeshift runway looking like they weren’t too sure of what exactly they were doing either.
We skipped the rest of the show, and returned to our car which had leaked a pool of oil slightly smaller than Lake Como. We called Avis and ascertained that the nearest open office was at the Venice airport, so we drove back there, stopping en route to get a liter of oil, with the oil dashboard light illuminated, as well as a yellow one with a figure of the engine with what looked like a little lightning bolt within it that we didn’t know the meaning of. The woman behind the Avis counter was the usual Italian solicitous persona, but we switched to a new Vectra and sped off.
Got to Follina, Italy without further incident, and checked into this lovely villa right in the town. Our room is so warm and cozy, with a large sitting area and a comfy chaise, with English floral furnishings and striped wallpaper. Wouldn’t you know it, as we went out for a little walk, we saw that a B & R bike trip was staying here for two nights (as are we) and they then move to the Villa Ciprani (as do we!). We spoke with the guides for a few minutes, then went upstairs, grateful that we were blissfully free of group dynamics!