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We fly from Heathrow to Venice
and take a water bus to our hotel
Sunday 9th November
2025
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Our flight was scheduled to depart at
10:30am on Sunday morning and although we could have left
home early in the morning, we decided to spend the previous
night at the Sofitel Hotel at Terminal 5. We had dinner
there too and were impressed by the standard of their
restaurant. Bruce loved his dessert, in particular.
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In the morning, it was
an easy walk from the hotel to the terminal and we were
soon in the lounge enjoying breakfast and a bit of plane
spotting. Before we knew it, it was time to board our plane
and depart for Venice. |
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Bruce usually gets the
window seat, but Geoff asked if he could have it this time,
for a change, which was fair enough. |
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Flying over the south
coast of England. The town on the left is Seaford in East
Sussex. A little further to the right is Cuckmere Haven
and the Seven Sisters Cliffs, with Beachy Head Cliffs on
the right. |
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Flying over the Alps
between Switzerland and Italy. |
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The city of Padua (Padova). |
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We were allocated a remote
gate at Venice's Marco Polo airport, so we had to take a
bus to the airport building. |
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It was our first arrival
in the Schengen area since the introduction of new rules,
which required us to register at designated machines. This
involved scanning our passports, having our photographs
taken, and registering our fingerprints. The process appeared
to work smoothly, but at the second stage, when we attempted
to use the automatic e-gates, both of us were rejected.
As a result, we had to queue to repeat our registration
manually with the assistance of an immigration officer.
She also encountered some difficulty capturing our details
on the first attempt, but eventually we were cleared to
proceed to the baggage reclaim area, where our luggage was
already waiting. We then walked a considerable distance
from the arrivals hall to reach the departure point for
the water bus, which was to take us across the Venice Lagoon
to the stop closest to our hotel. |
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Seated on the water bus
(Alilaguna), we were ready for our lagoon crossing. |
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Looking back towards
the departure point at the airport. |
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Thirty minutes later
we were dropped off at our stop, Madonna dell'Orto... |
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| ...and watched as our
water bus departed. |
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We walked past the church
called Madonna dell'Orto on the short walk to our hotel
and made a mental note to pop into it at some point for
a better look. |
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...and got even better
after receiving a really warm welcome from the staff and
then being shown to our room, which was amazing! |
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A pre-dinner drink in
the bar at the hotel. |
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We asked the hotel staff
to recommend a restaurant not too far away. They recommended
Osteria Ai40 Ladroni ("to the 40 thieves") which
advertises itself as a "typical Venetian tavern"
with "authentic flavours of the lagoon". The prices
were very reasonable and we enjoyed our meal there very
much. |
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One of the local speciality
desserts is Venetian cream with chocolate and Burano biscuits.
We shared one portion, which was delicious! |
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After dinner we walked
the short distance back to our hotel and had an early night.
We were looking forward to seeing Edith and Gregor, who
were due to arrive in the morning. |
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