Sunday 25 August 2013

Venice and Lake Garda, Italy

Our planned route to Italy took us straight through the breathtaking scenery of Austria from North to South with every turn and tunnel providing some amazing views. Mr H did his research and was aware that for this privilege we had to purchase a Go Box on route, 80 Euros (minimum price). This small plastic device is stuck inside the RV windscreen and is monitored by numerous overhead sensors along the motorway. Expensive but better than messing with Peages and Toll booths. It was tricky for Mr H to locate the correct place to purchase one, he queued in one long line of fellow travellers in the midday sun only to be told he needed to be at another shop fifty metres away! So off we go with our bright orange plastic box on the windscreen bleeping merrily every time the spy-in-the-sky clocked it!






The journey seemed to be downhill all the way to Northern Italy and the scenery continued to be stunning.



We continued on to the Adriatic Sea where we stayed for several weeks in the searing heat at http://www.campingcavallino.com/en-venice/ This site is on a peninsula which is lined with campsites along the main road from the town of Jesolo through Cavallino to Punta Sabbioni where you can catch a 30 minute ferry ride to Venice. The access roads to our pitch were as usual tight but Mr H managed to get us on and in some shade. The pitch was sandy and very close to the beach which was excellent with shallow sea a long way out. 
  

However, the pitch was covered in plants that regularly catapulted their seeds all over our groundsheet. Now normally this would not be a problem but these seeds were covered in vicious spikes that would puncture your feet and your bicycle tyres. Mr H has had two years of puncture-free cycling until arriving here where it became a regular occurrence.

A rather moist Mr H inspecting the damage

We had visited Venice a few years earlier and absolutely loved it. This time we took a trip both during the day and at night. Although it is still beautiful we were disappointed that the waterfront and St Mark's square in particular have become tacky, tired and overrun with casual traders.













There were fireworks on the beach once a week at 11.0pm which initially took us by surprise and scared us to death as we thought there were explosions right outside our windows!! Once we'd recovered and were able to prepare they provided a spectacular backdrop.




After a 3 weeks beach holiday we decided to move on and we wanted to visit Lake Garda which is on the way to Southern France. There are lots of campsites around the lake although access can be a problem. We were able to find large serviced pitches at http://www.piantelle.eu/lakegarda/ Whilst Lake Garda is as developed as Venice the Towns around the Lake have retained their charm without becoming tacky and we managed to visit Desenzano, Padenghe, Moniga, Manerba, San Felice and Salo which was our favourite. 












No comments:

Post a Comment