The city within a city! We visited the city on the last Sunday of the month (i think... cannot really remember the exact date lol) and it was free entrance for all. We were expecting a super long queue, but were still surprised by the number of tourists in line. The line stretched almost three quarters around the city, and later we heard that those that were half way in the line didn't even make it. We made the right choice of not joining the queue but went for the Basilica St Pietro instead.

From ground level, we climbed up a long series of spiralling steps until we hit the basilica itself, where we climbed up further (in between the dome. The dome is a double shell. Incredible isn't it!?) and got a wonderful view of the entire city. It was so crowded!

When we were in venice, the weather was super cold (I'm talking sub-zeros), and were weren't adequately dressed :S Nonetheless, we still managed to smile for the camera and went to a couple of attractions, like the Rialto Bridge for example (above).








Elita is our official tourguide as she reads out the description at each attraction as in her guidebook for Venice :) Winding down the crooked streets of Venice, we bumped into Xuhui. How small can the world get? And what a coincidence that we were going to the same city the following day!








A trip to Venice is never complete without a ride on the gondola. Well, I guess I should not be saying this because I was ready not to take a ride on the sampan when I heard how much the rower was going to charge us! I kept refusing to go onboard one until he finally relented and gave us a huge discount -.-" Cruising down the waterways was great though. The photo below was taken 4am in the morning, as we dragged ourselves to the river taxi before a bus ride that brings us to the airport. Ninjas alert!

Nope, it ain't as posh as I had imagined... But maybe we just went to the wrong parts of the city... Carrying our backpacks, we paced ourselves across the city to the Duomo, as we don't have much time here (we're on transit before our train to the next destination, Venice!). Well, it was hard work carrying 15kg on your back, but it was well worth it!