Day 92...Hit in head by flying pigeon -26th September

Nathan mixed a lot of drinks last night, coupled with not drinking any water before bed. So he woke up with one mother of a hangover. We packed up and left our bags at reception so we could explore Venice a little more. When Nate stood up to use his credit card, I saw all the colour drain from his face! He told me later he thought he was either going to crap himself or pass out. Thankfully that passed and I bought us some water and sandwiches to eat in the square near our hotel. We sat on a bench but Nate couldn’t eat. So he eyed off the numerous pigeons that were hanging around instead. He doesn't like pigeons. We got onto the Grand Canal taxi and rode down to San Marco square. The tide was up and some parts of the city was having water wash over its laneways, spilling around tables and chairs and splashing up onto the doors. We landed at our stop and fought the hordes of tourists and touts to get to San Marco. The water was puddled in many places and pigeons abounded (much to Nathans consternation). People were having them land on their arms like lorikeets. Ew! Don’t they know that they’re flying rats?

Nathan was feeling a bit better, so I plonked him down to eat his sandwiches and glare at the pigeons while I took some quick photos. The line to San Marco was atrocious so we decided to skip it. There were Yankee tourists everywhere! It was ruining our romantic and sedate view of the Venice we got yesterday, so we decided to leave. I wandered a little and took some photos. There were pigeons everywhere! They flew so close, it was so tempting to just fling your hand out and wack one mid flight! Or punch it out of the air in an explosion of feathers haha. I returned from my photos to a very disgruntled Nathan who had been hit in the head by a flying pigeon! I couldn’t stop laughing.

We boated back, grabbed our stuff and staggered hungover through the streets and back to our car. From there, we headed to Modena, as Ferrari is near there. The town of Modena was quite cute, but the TIC told us that everywhere was booked in town. Also that Ferrari was actually in Marrenello, 20 km away. So we drove there instead, and got the same response. It was a small industrial town and we asked at a few hotels but they were booked out! One guy booked us a place that he knew of, and we spent a long and frustrating drive to get there, only to find that it as a 4 star resort. I had walked into ask reception about the room that was booked and she told me it as 180 euro. I told her I would be park the car and be back - and ran away! We asked so many places, and after 4 hours were thinking perhaps we should go to the resort when we finally FINALLY found one for 48 euro. Shared bathroom. We were so relieved and so tired that the guy was a little surprised when I did a dance in his lobby! It was a budget place, no different to the others we’d stayed. From 4pm to 8.30pm we had been searching and thought we’d have to fork out or sleep in the car. For dinner, I asked ‘manjana’ to the guy (he didn’t speak English – I was asking in Italian regarding rooms and costs most of the time) and through hand signals he sent us to a place up the road. It was cute and simple and did the trick. Nathan had pasta and I learnt a valuable lesson in Italian food. When you order veal, you get….veal. That’s it. You have to buy your salad or veges separate.

Headed home to bed and watched Ice Age in Italian.