I officially planned my first 2 weeks of my trip a few weeks ago. What a relief it was to have things set in stone! I was stressing out a bit doing too much research; you know sometimes I wish there weren’t so many options in this world! The Paris hostel that I will be staying at is called Le Montclair Hostel Montmartre and I got my dorm room on sale at http://www.hostelbookers.com/; it ended up being the cheapest hostel thus far and for Paris that ain’t too shabby! I also received an email from le hostel informing me that if I "like" them on fb and write on their page I can win a free night’s stay or a bottle of wine or a free dinner, so I better get on that! Montmartre is famous for having been home to some of the greatest artists ever such as Dali, Picasso, Monet, Van Gogh; if I ever needed inspiration I believe this is where I’ll find it. I am such a nerd, I actually look up every hostel that I research on google maps and go to street view to see if the neighbourhood is pretty enough and I do a virtual tour. This is probably why it takes me so damn long to research! But then again I don’t watch much tv so I do have the time for other areas of entertainment.
I ended up booking the Thello train from Paris to Venice for Thursday March 1st. Although I said it would be nice to take a day train to get a glimpse of the glory outside the window, a 12 hour train ride is daunting so I decided the sleeper train would be more beneficial to me. The prices were about the same as a day ride but at least with the sleeper train I won’t have to worry about accommodations for that night. Also favourable would be that I get another almost full day in Paris. If I chose the day train I would have to catch the train early in the morning and I would have been arriving in Venice way past daylight so for safety and convenience, I decided leaving Paris at 7 pm on Thursday and arriving in Venice at 8 am on Friday would be my best possible choice.
The hostel in Venice that I will be staying at for that weekend is called "Sweet Dreams". So far, it is a bit more expensive than the other hostels I’ve booked but if you look at the pictures of this place it looks like the inside of a castle! I actually was having trouble deciding between this hostel and another so my father flipped a coin for me and the decision was made by the gods!
Venice tip: If taking a train to Venice, make sure your stop is S. Lucia since that is the stop that takes you directly into Venice and not Venezia Mestre as that stop is outside the city.
Things are coming along quite smoothly even though I am getting very excited, having trouble sleeping and getting a visit from the scratchy throat and nasty cough fairy but I still have a few more days to build my immune system so things are looking up!
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