OK... this is the point at which Nat and I go our seperate ways, and new guest stars are introduced. I picked up mum in London and we flew to Venice where Uncle Michael was waiting (literally at the ferry stop). Unfortunately from a blogging point of view Mum and Michael are not very good at taking photos so they are either of them, or me, but rarely all of us together!

Venice I have to say was mixed. Obviously the setting is out of this world, but the sheer number of tourists meant it felt a little like a floating italian themed disney land. There are only 55,000 venetians living on the main island and 15,000 tourists a day. The numbers of locals are dropping due to high costs and the pain of tourists so one day it could just be tourists, and locals who work in the tourist industry!

The gelato went some way to making up for it, and the more we walked (and I went my own way for 1 of our 4 days) and saw empty streets the better it got. I went to a very good modern art exhibition at the Palazzo Grassi (www.palassograssi.it) and this again helped to remove me from the ubiquitous tourists.