Happy Thanksgiving!

This will be a Thanksgiving day to remember! Of course we miss being with our family, but you are all in our thoughts. We are so very thankful for our family, our friends, and our good health.

Our Thanksgiving meal had no turkey in it. We ate at a small trattoria that was recommended in the Rick Steves tour book. What a great place it was! First good sign, it was really crowded. Second, friendly staff. We weren't disappointed with the food, either. We started with a large bowl of clams (or, as the English version of the menu said "clamps") and the house wine. We each followed the clams with a pasta dish and then, something we saw other people getting, which we can't remember the name of. (Sarah, can you help here?) It was served in a chanpagne glass and was a combination of lemon ice cream, vodka, and sparkling wine. We really like it and are going to try to recreate this at home. We asked a guy at the next table to take our picture. He and his friend were originally from New York but now live in London. The told us we picked the best place on the island of Murano to eat. Those 2 guys have been eating there for over 15 years, and with all the choices of places to eat, that's a good endorsement.

Now let me back up and tell you how our day began. We decided to visit two of the islands that are in the Venice lagoon, Burano and Murano. We caught the water bus to Burano on another picture-perfect day. We were in awe of the brightly painted buildings as our boat pulled up to the vaporetto stop. We wandered around enjoying the sights and watching residents go about their business. Burano is known for lace making, so we visited the Lace Museum (Bill was not too thrilled about that, but he was a good sport.) One of the women showed me the intricate process involved in making lace and I was really impressed because of the needlework that I've done. Bill was pacing outside during this demonstration. After I got the full explanation, I made a graceful exit and joined Bill to continue our tour of the island. One of the interesting sights is a leaning clock tower which leans at the same angle (5 degrees) as the Leaning Tower of Pisa. We took pictures of it, but they don't do it justice. The whole island is like a picture post card. There was just one beautiful photo op after another.

Oh my God I couldn't believe it when Cindy said we had to leave Burano the cradle of the lace world. I was just getting started picking out patterns for my new lace tennis ball covers! I was thinking of getting Taki and Vernie matching lace shirts for Christmas but I couldn't find any orange lace. Well maybe I will have better luck on my next visit to lace world! Onward to Murano the island named after our car. As you know (if you don't you should) Murano is known for their glass production. They started making glass on Murano because of the danger to the wooden structures on the island of Venice. I guess the furnaces that put out over 1400 degrees may play havoc with a city with a lot of wooden buildings. We toured the history of glass museum and were amazed with all the glass bottles, bowls, vases, etc they had on display from the first century AD. I think I saw a sticker on one of the bottles that said made in China. It was in Italian so I'm not really sure. We went into a glass factory and viewed the things they had for sale. I went up to the second floor and the sales person followed me up and said that the things on this floor were not souvenirs but for collectors. I wonder how he knew I wasn't a collector! We did make a few purchases and the item I bought Cindy is in the photo below. I wanted to get something unique and something that would remind us of this trip to Murano. Now she is saying she can't fit it in her carryon. just when I thought I had the perfect gift for her.

We hopped a Vaporetto for Venice and were hoping to end up near St Mark's so we could catch the Ferry back to our hotel. Well we ended up at the far end of Venice by the bus station. The opposite end of where we wanted to be. So instead of taking another boat we took one last walk through Venice streets and we were glad that we did.