Italy 3 – England 0 - Italy in spring 2018! – Part 2 - Venice Lido

[BONZO]

Well, here we go with the next trip and as mentioned before this was my freebie.

As a bit of background, turningleftforless – tag line “Champagne travel on a Prosecco budget” is one of a few good sites I regularly visit to check for any bargain flights, hotels etc. We have met the site owner Michelle on a couple of occasions but that didn’t influence any outcome.

She ran a competition with the top prize being two economy flights to Venice on BA so I thought it was worth a go and to be honest I was really interested in getting a couple of tickets for the i360 in Brighton which was the runner up prize. Time passed and I was very surprised to find an e-mail to say that I’d won!

I honestly never win anything, ever, period!

We initially weren’t sure when to go but then the penny dropped as we realised we could go on my birthday weekend so that was the decision made – it was a bank holiday weekend so minimal time off work needed. (All of this was pre-booked before Rusty had his condition so we booked kennels for him).

As you’ve read from part 1, Rusty continued to maintain his health but no significant improvements to report. He was ok but still refused to eat anything so they inserted a feeding tube to insert a liquid diet. We monitored his situation on the lead up to the May Bank Holiday weekend and thought at one stage he may be coming home, if nothing else for some time with us.

As the week went on it became clear he’d have to stay in over the weekend after all. All the time we stayed on standby and ready to cancel the trip. We spoke to the vet in advance and she said to go on the trip as there was nothing we could do from home – as long as we were contactable in the event of a decision to be made.

As part of the planning, Alison left it to me to pick a hotel within a certain budget – sure thing, no problem, just leave it to me - what could possibly go wrong ?

Well, back to Gatwick airport again but this time we arrived at that awkward time somewhere between breakfast and dinner. One batch was being cleared away and the other being prepared, nothing else for it but to settle down with some Taittinger champagne and watch the world go by then.

[BONZO]

Saturday 5th May 2018

Well, as we’d been to Venice airport before we’d got things “down pat”, or at least I had. The funny thing is that for the most part once I’ve been somewhere once I usually tend to remember but don’t ask me what happened yesterday! It was a big of a slog out of the airport and down to the vaporrezzo, not sure if it’s been done that way on purpose to avoid queuing or not.

Last time we were here there was only a couple of services running as it was well out of season (January) but this time there was more choice. We boarded the boat and settled down for the hour long trip across the Venice lagoon and onto Venice Lido.

We stepped off the boat and onto the Lido for the first time and the initial impressions were very good. So laid back, peaceful and such a contrast to the main Venice area that we’d been to before. I had the directions to the hotel and we strolled along the road, keeping an eye out for the place. I let Alison go ahead as we passed number of flat fronted magnolia coloured hotels before arriving at the Grande Albergo Ausonia & Hungaria Wellness & Spa.

We walked past it initially as it looked so flamboyant and upscale and thought to ourselves “surely this isn’t the place?” After a couple of double takes I recognised the exterior of the building and said “yup, that’s the place”. (I think I heard some mutterings from Alison along the lines of ‘OMG, that’s the last time I leave it to you to book a hotel!’, but I might have been wrong)

We entered the lobby area and was warmly greeted by the reception staff who said we could book breakfast in advance but we politely declined. We thought we’d make the decision each day as required.

We found our room which was in contrast to the façade but comfortable enough with a high ceiling and local furniture. The only downside was the bed was a sleigh type, not the thing for Alison’s long legs but she had to muddle through.

We left our bags in the room and went for a wander around the lido to get a feel for the place. The first thing that struck us was the number of cars and mopeds about, we kept forgetting to look out for traffic when crossing the road!

The whole area was very relaxed and laid back, no one rushing about and a little more upscale but not pretentious. We strolled down to the beach area and wandered along the sand, looking at the derelict beauty of some of the old hotels, some of which were in the process of being restored to their former glory.

Just before returning to the hotel we stopped in a small café and had a couple of coffees. Well, I had a Caffè corretto – afterwards, I found out that it consists of a shot of espresso "corrected" with a shot of liquor, usually grappa, brandy or sambuca. Delicious!

We freshened up in our room and did a quick search for somewhere suitable to eat this evening. Strangely, I thought I’d noticed a Thai restaurant next door to the hotel so we stopped searching and decided to take the short walk there. (We somehow always gravitate to Thai restaurants when abroad!)

As we approached, I noticed the Thai style Buddha logo but as it happens it was an Indian restaurant!

Buddha Soul Resto was the name of the place.

Well, no problem, I was happy with either cuisine to be honest. We sat down outside and looked over the menu, absolutely nothing like menus at home and all the better for it. I ordered a local craft beer (who would have thought it?) and ordered up a Thali.

WOW! – Just WOW

the food was absolutely superb, full of flavour and just the right heat/strength.

We chatted with the owner after the meal and he explained how he’d been to India to carry out some research to get the authentic cooking techniques and flavours. Simply one of the best Indian meals I’ve ever had.

We stopped in the outside bar area of our hotel for a quick coffee before calling it a night.

[BONZO]

Sunday 6th May 2018

I had a good night’s sleep but I think Alison had struggled a bit as she was already awake and reading a book. As it was my birthday today I was showered with cards and read all the birthday greetings on Facebook etc.

Then the vets phoned, it was the call that we’d been half expecting / half dreading. That morning Rusty had taken a turn for the worse and they wanted our decision. They were currently administering CPR but without a pause we just said let him go, he’d suffered enough.

Typical bloody dog, going on my birthday! 

No chance of forgetting this anniversary then!



The end of an era but he did have 13 of the most fantastic years any dog could have asked for – no regrets. With heavy hearts we prepared ourselves for the day ahead, nothing more we could have done for him whether we’d been at home or not.

We decided to try the hotel for breakfast as there didn’t seem to be many obvious options within a reasonable walking distance of the hotel. The breakfast buffet was simply enormous, full of continental cold cuts and some hot items such a scrambled eggs, sausage etc. Hot drinks were waitressed served, we normally find this if the staff don’t want people fiddling with the Gaggia and making it break down.

We returned to the room, comfortably full and made plans for the day.

We took a slow walk down to the beach and settled down with a couple of sun loungers and umbrella as the sun rose and the temperatures climbed higher and higher. We lounged around for a while and took a couple of refreshing swims in the sea before breaking for a light lunch in the beachside café.

After further relaxing and swimming we called it a day late in the afternoon and made our way back to the hotel. We decided to walk back a different way to get a better feel for the area which was all very pleasant.

After a shower and change we headed out for a stroll along the promenade as the last of the sun’s heat died away and it slowly dropped towards the horizon. Feeling a bit peckish we just checked google and TripAdvisor for a list of the reasonably priced restaurants nearby. We settled on La Taverna on Via Tiro 9, Lido di Venezia as a likely option and wandered round a few quiet back streets before we found it.

A real little gem of a place, nothing much to look at from the outside and so many locals and only us here as tourists. There was a constant stream of people turning up in cars and on mopeds, getting a takeaway, having a chat and moving on.

If you sat inside you could watch the people preparing the pizza on a marble counter before going into the wood-fired over but it was far too hot for that – we just sat outside on the pavement tables and had a couple of small carafes of wine and a pizza each. I did look at the £15 vintage Moretti beer but though better of it. Overall the food was wonderful, cheap and authentic, well worth seeking out.

We took a slow stroll back to the hotel in the warm evening heat and crashed out for the night.

Monday 7th May 2018

For some reason we have very few notes about today! Basically we were up and out early, picked up the boat back to the airport promptly, and headed straight through security and into the lounge for some breakfast before the plane back to Gatwick.

Everything went very smoothly and we were home quickly.

Just one more leg of our Italian Spring adventures to go!