Venice 2013 Day 2

Ciao! Our first full day in Venice and also the day of the famous Festa del Redentore (Feast of the Most Holy Redeemer), a festival held in every 3rd weekend of July which celebrates the end of the plague of 1576. We woke up pretty late (9 am) probably due to jet lag and had a wonderful breakfast in the executive lounge at Hilton. The breakfast buffet was decent - juice, muffins, hams, croissants, and yogurts. After breakfast, we checked our hotel shuttle schedule and took the ferry to St Mark's Square. The ferry ride was around 15 minutes and not crowded at all! The ferry stopped in front of the monument, very close to St Mark's Square.

First, we passed by the famous Bridge of Sighs where crowded with people taking photos, well I was one of them! Last time we were here, the bridge was covered due to renovation so I can't help but take a few photos!

Then, we passed by St Mark's Square  it was already crowded with groups of tourists! Too bad one side of the Basilica was under repair so I couldn't get a full photo of it....another reason to come back next time right?

Today's itinerary: no itinerary!  We decided to walk around without map (well even with a map, you'll get lost in Venice but don't worry almost everywhere you go will be marked with arrows pointing to main sights such as St Mark's Square  Rialto Bridge, and Accademia Bridge) and take our time to really enjoy this unique city of water!  Venice is one of the best cities for photographers in my opinion because every canal and every angle is unique on their own way!

I love this old man's art stand in front of the church!

Little canals were filled with gondolas....

Have you ever got frustrated by tourists that keep getting into your precious vacation photos? One way to avoid them is by taking the back roads...away from tourists. 

I love the color of the old buildings with the green canal in between!

Somehow, we ended up at the Rialto bridge! There were filled with tourists...we had to wait at least 5 minutes to get a spot to take the famous postcard perfect photo of the Grand Canal!

The green and blue poles really caught our eyes, another angle to take a photo of the bridge.

At this time, it was already noon so we stopped to have lunch. Yep, we followed the recommendations to avoid the restaurants along the Grand Canal near Rialto and with waiters standing outside to tried to pull you in!  Instead, we walked a few more streets pass Rialto and saw a restaurant with the Trip Adviser sticker! You really can't go wrong with the Trip Advisor sticker haha! The restaurant's name is Osteria ai Storti. We ordered the tourist menus: seafood pasta of potatoes and spaghetti with clams with a large salad. Food was okay and total cost 26.5 euros which is not bad for Venice!

After lunch, we strolled down to the fish/fruit market area of San Polo; we didn't get a chance to navigate this far last time we were here.  This photo was taken on the end of the market area and on the back of Rialto bridge, not the typical Grand Canal view from Rialto but another colorful side of Venice!

We walked back heading toward St Mark's Square area and stopped by for what's better on a hot humid day than gelato!  Averaged price for two scopes was 2.5 euros, the gelato shops around St Mark's Square cost 1 extra euros and not as good!  I picked my favorite flavor....tiramisu!! Ahhhh so creamy and refreshing, one of the food that I missed from my last trip (gelato and pizza).

We didn't noticed the Lion of Venice three years ago until I saw many photos of it afterwards...we found it this time, right at the Manin Square.

Instead of heading back to St Mark's Square to catch the ferry ride back to Hilton, we decided to across the Accademia Bridge to head over to  Dorsoduro and take the ferry there. The view of Grand Canal from Accademia Bridge......beautiful! When we were at the bridge taking photos, there was a guy who offered people to take photos of them...we thought how nice of him....until........right after the photo he asked people for 1 euro!!! Beware of this guy, we saw him again at St Mark's Square near the Bridge of Sighs too!

We never spent time over at  Dorsoduro last time we were in Venice and so glad we did this time! It was not crowded like St Mark's Square and we enjoyed the quiet side of Venice with gorgeous scenery! We walked to Santa Maria della Salute, this beautiful building that we passed by so many times but never had a chance to walk in. Here's a photo of the interior:

There were many people sitting outside on the steps of Santa Maria della Salute, the view of the Grand Canal here was another good spot for photos!

We sat here as well to rest for a few minutes and enjoy the great view of Venice.  I turned back and saw the structures on the exterior of the building and was amazed by it.

We took the ferry back to Hilton and get ready for the fireworks...it was around 7 pm and the fireworks started at 11:30 pm. I have been looked for a restaurant with a good view of the fireworks but ended up either all restaurants with good views were booked months ahead or too expensive (Hilton's Skyline Bar dinner menu was around 320 euros per person!!!!) We walked down Giudecca and checked out each restaurant...everywhere was booked!!! Locals already marked their spot and setting up their table along the river bank!! 

We walked passed the Il Redentore church and the bridge of barges was filled with people walking from  Dorsoduro to Giudecca.

It was crowded..it reminded me of new year's eve party! It was really a big party here, locals have their table set up, drinks, music, and dance!

As we walked around, we found a spot in between locals' marked spot....very lucky! We decided to sit here and wait for 3.5 hours for the fireworks!  There was no way that we could come back later and find a spot where we have a nice view of the fireworks. I sat down holding the spot while hubby went back to the hotel to get our camera and tripods for the show! It took him at least half an hour to get back...it was that crowded! We skipped dinner that night :( but it was well worth it!  There were food stand around the church so hubby bought panini and water. We waited and waited, sun had set, and party began! The wait wasn't too bad as there were many people-seeing and music.

I was checking my cellphone for time every 15 minutes or so!!! And just a few minutes before 11:30, all the lights were turned off...the show began! The fireworks was spectacular, the best I've seen! No idea how to describe, you have to be there to feel the atmosphere around and the colorful reflections on San Marco's Bay.  Here are photos to share with all of you!

The half hour fireworks felt like a long time with surprises every stage of the firework show. The hours of wait was well worth it and we were so glad that we made it to Venice at this very unique festival!

After the fireworks, we walked back to Hilton...took us like half an hour since everyone was making their way back! When we got back to the hotel, we showered and right to sleep LOL, it was a long night! Good night Venice, will explore you more tomorrow!

Venice 2013 Day 1

Ciao Venice, we are back!

It has been 3 years since our first time visiting Venice back during our honeymoon. While I was planning our Spain trip, I saw firework photos of the Festa del Redentore (a big festival in Venice each year during the third weekend of July, it celebrates since the end of the plague of 1576, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festa_del_Redentore) and I found out that we'll be in Europe during that time. How can we miss this right? And another excuse to go back to Venice which is our #2 favorite place on Earth! For every big events while traveling aboard, the most important things to secure first are hotel and flight! I started to look at both 4 months prior. I found an incredible deal in Hotwire, hot rate for a 5 stars hotel in the island of Giudecca (where the fireworks will take place) for $138 per night that weekend!!! How can you beat that! That rate is less than a 3 stars hotel in San Marco area. The risk of booking a hot rate hotel from Hotwire is that the identity of the hotel will be revealed after you make the payments and no cancellation. I have searched the net for 5 stars hotel in Giudecca and only two so can't go wrong with either one! I made up my mind and booked right away and turned out to be the Hilton Molino Stucky!

After 18 hours of flight, we finally made it to Venice (7 hours from Boston to Madrid, then a long layover from Madrid to Rome ~2.5 hours and Rome to Venice ~ 1 hour). We were tired but worth every effort to get back to Venice! We arrived at Marco Polo Airport around 5:45 pm, first we went to the Tourist Information Desk (on the right side after you get out to the arrival hall) and bought our museum passes and water bus (ACTV) travel cards. The museum pass is 24 euros and reduced is 18 euros (with Rolling Venice card for tourists aged between 14 and 29 for 4 euros), the 32 hours travel card is 25 euros and the reduced 72 hours pass is 22 euros. Then we headed to the left side to counter 71 to pick up our shared water taxi service to our hotel. I booked this ahead from Venice Link, it was 100 euros round trip for 2 of us. We got a ticket and the guy instructed us to follow the white canopy all the way to the end to get to the water taxi, the walk was around 5 minutes and the path was okay with our luggage. When we got there, three pairs of couples were already in the taxi so total 8 passengers.

I was praying for the water taxi to go through Grand Canal route and it came true!  It was an amazing ride down the Grand Canal! We got out of the cabin and took photos, that's already worth every penny of the ride! 

Our water taxi dropped one pair of couple off after the Rialto Bridge then headed to San Marco! 

Another couple got off San Marco square and then four of us left headed to the Hilton. There's no need to tip the driver, I heard someone was asking this question at the service desk at the airport. Check-in was quick, we got an upgrade since hubby is a Hilton Honors Diamond member with free breakfast and access to the Executive Lounge, what a deal!

We got to our room, boy the hotel is huge, with different towers! The room is small but it's Venice which I already expected (still bigger than our Paris room). The decors are new with marble bathroom and a nice Murano glass chandelier!  

After we dropped off our luggage, we headed out for dinner, we were pretty starving by then (we had a sandwich at the airport in Madrid for lunch). We walked down and checked the menu out from each restaurant with outside seating. We passed by around 6 restaurants and picked Ostaria ae Botti to have our first dinner at Venice. Service was very slow as expected since Italians will not rush like us LOL! We got seated on the 2nd row by the lagoon, the view of Zattere was amazing!

We ordered the 2 appetizers: soute mussels and clams (15 euros) and shrimp cocktails (12 euros), and main courses we ordered the steak fillet grilled (22 euros) and the "Fried Mixed Real" (mix of seafoods) for 25 euros, a liter of water was 4.5 euros. The shrimp cocktails were excellent; I like the sauce which is not the cocktail sauce we used to have in the US, soute mussels and clams were okay, my grilled steak was great quality, and hubby's mixed fried seafood was the best! The fried shrimps and clams were my favorite! The total price of the dinner was 91.50 euros, they automatically added 12% service charge which is not bad for a great dinner in Venice with excellent view!

After a great dinner, it was a very nice walk back to the hotel. We stopped by the Executive Lounge, it was still open till 11 pm, with free water and drinks and fruits throughout the day. We had a bottle of my favorite Fanta and went back up to our room. 

Good night Venice, it's the only the beginning of our trip and we already enjoy every single second of it!

Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Brooklyn Botanic Garden

April 21, 2013

It has been almost half a year since my last vacation so my "vacation bugs" started to bite me LOL!  I was looking for a short weekend trip; I just can't wait to go on vacation!  At first, I was thinking to go to Washington D.C. for its annual Cherry Blossom Festival in late March/early April. I saw many beautiful photos of cherry blossoms and I want to be there myself.  But my plan ruined since something urgent came back so I couldn't go :( Then I was searching around to see if there are any nearby flower festivals and I found the Cherry Blossom Festival at Brooklyn Botanic Garden, New York!  The festival is April 27-28 but I don't want to go during the festival because it will be so crowded and that other people's heads or arms will  appeared in my photos (you know what I mean!).  So we went during the weekend of April 21-22. It was at least a 4 hours drive but we stayed over the weekend so weren't too bad.

We visited the Brooklyn Botanic Garden on Sunday, I wanted to go on Saturday but the weather wasn't good for photos.  The garden opens at 10 am during weekends, we got there right after it opened. There's a parking lot in front of the entrance to the garden, it's charged by hourly rate (I think it was somewhere around $8 for 3 hours so wasn't bad at all....remember it's New York)! We went to the entrance and bought our tickets $10 per person. We entered without a line but the place quickly filled up.  

At the entrance of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

First, we started with the Japanese Hill and Pond Garden where there were many cherry trees at their peak bloom! The cherry blooming map can be found at the garden's website: http://www.bbg.org/discover/cherries

The Japanese Garden's landscaping was beautiful, I almost felt that I am in Japan except I saw tall buildings on the background!

Doesn't this feels like Japan?

We made a whole loop around the pond and then walked up to the hill where there it was packed with people taking photos under the cherry trees! 

It was impossible to have a photo without someone else in my photo so I had to take more close ups.  I walked up to a branch of the tree and took some macros of the blossoms. The garden has many varieties of cherry so I took photos one tree by one tree, it was a lot of fun.  The hardest part when taking macro is motion; every shake from the wind will cause the photo to be blurry. Also I read somewhere that the pastel color of the blossoms will trick the camera's exposure so best to bump up the exposure.  I followed the advise and dialed up the exposure to a full stop, the photos came out exactly I was hoping for!

My favorite blossoms were the pink ones!

After the little "hill" we ended up at the Cherry Esplanade but the cherry trees were not bloom yet!!!! I imagined how beautiful this place will be when the cherry trees are in full bloom! Maybe one day I'll be able to be here at the peak bloom time!!

Two whole rows of cherry trees at the Cherry Esplanade:

Hubby was taking photo of me while I took a photo of him!

Next to the Cherry Esplanade is the Rose Garden but the roses were in bloom yet. We turned back and walked to the Magnolia Plaza, here many colorful flowers were in full bloom!

I love the combinations of bright colored petals and different shades of pastel petals!

We walked down to the Lily Pool Terrace where tulips were in full bloom! There were so many varieties of tulips that I never seen or heard of. I started from the front of the row and took photos of each variety to the back, I think it took me at least half an hour to get through all of them.  Plus it was so crowded with photographers like us LOL!  Sometimes we had to wait to have a space to squeeze in!  Here's a photo I took of my husband fighting for room with other photographers hahahaha:

Cameras pointing here and there but at least you won't feel like you are the only one making awkward position to take a photo!  I have to say I must take at least a hundred photos of the tulips!  Here are my favorite ones:

I love the arrangement of the tulips from light pink, to pink, then red, and bright red!

This picture made me want to visit Holland someday to its famous tulip festival!

My favorite color: purple and pink!

The Lily Pool was beautiful as well with the reflection of the building:

I love how this photo came out to be, only the tulip in the middle opened up!

It was my first time using our new 100mm macro lens, it really brings me another fun topic to explore!  This was my first time really look so close into a flower; it has a whole new layer of colors!

We left the garden at almost 1 pm!! Almost 3 hours there and it went by very fast (that's what happen when so many beautiful subject to take photos of)!  Our last look at the cherry blossoms as we walked pass by the Japanese Garden to exit:

Brooklyn Botanic Garden was the highlight of our weekend trip to New York! I am sure there are plenty to see and enjoy throughout the year in this garden!