So this morning I looked out the window to this:

And by afternoon I looked out our new window to this:

We have also traded the sounds of small birds and leaves swishing in the breeze for church bells, boat traffic and people voices.
But most of all we feel at home here. So glad to be able to unpack and stay in one place for 3 weeks. The big exhale–it’s here.
We said our goodbyes in the morning to Palma, Brad and Giulia and took off in our Fiat Punto. We stopped once, for coffee and a panino and the drive took us about 4 hours.
Turning in the car and walking to the apartment was easy. I had really studied the google map and Sebastiano, our new “land lord” gave me landmarks to look for.
We love the apartment. It is probably the nicest place we’ve ever rented, well equipped, too. This guy has thought of everything. Here’s the welcome gift he had on the table when we arrived:

He stayed here talking with us for quite a while–restaurants, neighborhoods, kids etc.. He’s a nice guy.
After Sebastiano left we walked back to Piazzale Roma and topped up our vaporetto cards from last time. And we went to the big COOP grocery store.
Then we went for our first official walk around our new Dorsoduro neighborhood. We weren’t 5 minutes into it when we were seriously lost. Lost in Venice, holding hands and smiling–that’ the picture. Finally it was 7:30 and I still had to cook dinner so we found our way home, with the help of the map, a few times, of course.
Took this picture right around the corner:

I made pasta with onions and pancetta for dinner and we had some already cooked (and pretty tasteless) chard from the COOP. And we drank the Prosecco Sebastiano had left for us. Perfect first cena in Venezia.
After dinner we went for another walk, this time in the direction of San Polo–much more familiar territory–we walked to the Frari church, Ken got a gelato and that was it.
If you can’t tell–I’m thrilled to be here!