29 February 2012

TWS - The End

One, two ... skip a few ... I have come to the conclusion that the best way to make the weeks fly by is to commit to keeping a weekly record of something!

Today, as I'm sure you're aware, is the last day of Summer. More importantly for the purposes of this post it is also the end of my Thirteen Weeks of Summer plan/challenge to myself. Now, I'm the first to admit that I did a shocking job of posting updates over those thirteen weeks but what I am very pleased to report is that I did do reasonably well at actually setting and achieving some very satisfactory things over the time. So much so in fact that some of my 'organisation' challenges are now almost habits and some very big 'to do' items that had been hanging over my head for months are now gone.

So, following lessons learned both from that challenge and the other two plans that I made three months ago, it is clear to me that new plans need to be made. I'll let you in on them once I've sorted my thoughts out - some things will stay, some will go and some will be rejigged a little before I try again.

Stay tuned ... (or don't, it's your choice).

28 February 2012

Travelday - Where I Lose my Heart

Our fist glimpse from the train.
 
I've never been a particularly romantic person.

Canals and bridges ... be still my beating heart.

I'm not one of those girls who grew up dreaming of visiting Paris or New York or Venice.

St Mark's was lovely by day or night, but by night there were no crowds which we definitely preferred.

I wanted to travel, I have always wanted to travel, but my dreams were more of the Daintree, Antarctica, the Galapagos Islands and the Grand Canyon.

One of my favourites from the whole holiday - The Sparky's patience with these long exposure photos is beyond me.

I'm a nature girl at heart and cities and towns have never particularly appealed to me so no one was more surprised than I when I fell totally and completely head over heels in love with Venice.

Our new favourites - short black, macchiato and cannoli (please excuse the dodgy night time iPhone quality)

As in, I didn't want to leave.

Self-portrait in St Mark's Square our first night.

As in, I want to go back now.

Lots of water means lots of water transport.


As in, this is the one place we will probably deliberately plan to get back to - even before we've visited all of the many other wonderful places we want to get to.

No matter the angle or time of day everything was beautiful.

As in, I could go on and on and on about how I love the place but couldn't even begin to explain to you why.

The room upgrade may have had something to do with it.


I don't know if it's just because it's the first big overseas holiday we've had ...

Eclectic, random, historic and artistic but still structured and organised - maybe that's the answer, Venice is The Sparky and I


(I'm sorry New Zealand, I love you but you're just too close and too similar to be classed as an overseas holiday)

Proof that we were, in fact, there.

... and maybe I'll fall like this every where I go ...

Various views from the top of the bell tower ... well worth the extra Euros.
 
... all I know for the moment is that I am totally smitten and it just won't go away.


27 February 2012


My ride home from the train station the other night was an old-school school bus! Very cool.

22 February 2012

A Little More of Venice

I'm still to-ing and fro-ing on the whole Venice post but have at least come to the conclusion that there is more to it that I can put in one post and that it will probably take me from now until Tuesday to put something together. In the meantime I will share with you some of the photos that I believe should be admired on their own ...

21 February 2012

Travelday Teaser

I'm still working my way through what to say about Venice, which photos to post and whether or not to cram it all into one long post or to spread the love a little. Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow with something more but in the meantime I leave you with some teaser photos -

From the sublime ...


... to the, errr ...


... I'd say ridiculous but they both look like they'd come to get me in the middle of the night!

14 February 2012

Travelday - Where we walk on a roof

Please excuse the lack of commentary today, I am for some unexplainable reason dealing with my third migraine in a week and it's taking a lot of energy to get through my work day much less anything extra.

Milan -









P.S. Elephant explained here.