Our trip to Venice this weekend was, to say the very least, comical. Jenna and I figured it would be a good idea to wait to buy our train tickets on Saturday morning, with the intention of leaving Florence around 9:00 am, only to get there and discover that all the trains were full until noon (this ended up being a perfectly fine thing, however, as we spent the next three hours shopping in Florence). Upon arriving around 2:00 pm, Jack, Kenny and Aaron met Jenna and I at the train station and we went to go drop our things off at the hotel room they had gotten the night before in a tiny alley way in the less touristy side of the city. Again, Jenna and I had the bright idea that we would just crash for the night in their room on the floor and split the cost five ways rather than booking our own room, giving us all a good deal.

We sat down for lunch and some wine and then walked around the inner streets of Venice and made our way to Piazza San Marco and the edge of the city. Although I have been to Venice before, I didn't remember it too well, and I was blown away by how beautiful it is - the bridges and waterways really got me. After seeing most of the city, we pooled our money together for a gondola ride that truly made this fast and stupidly expensive trip worth it in the end. Going around the city by water really affected the way I experienced Venice. After the gondola ride, we went for dinner and explored the city some more, ending our night at a packed Irish pub screening an Italian soccer match that had gone into extra time.

Ready to head back for the evening around 1:00 am, the five of us walked into the hotel and were immediately stopped by the receptionist, who would not allow Jenna and I to go upstairs, as he had noted that there were only supposed to be three guys staying in the room - he refused to even let the two of us go up to their room and grab our backpacks. Walking back outside, I honestly thought Jenna and I were going to be sleeping in the train station. Jack, Kenny and Aaron helped us find a hotel that had a room available relatively quickly, though, and we ended up sleeping in our own beds instead of on the floor of the boy's room. Waking up this morning, we realized how sketchy of a hotel we had just spent the night in, paid, and left to again realize that we were idiots and thought we would be able to get an early train back by buying our tickets in the morning, but all the trains were full until half past noon.

Venice 1, Nicole & Jenna 0.