Trieste ... well one more day in Italy .....

Another good nights sleep had me waking up refreshed and ready for the boat to Trieste and on to Slovenia and Croatia. Saying good by to the ......

........ Hotel Argentina and the busy little town ....

I set off for a last look around town and to find the boat. This group of locals over on vacation from Trieste insisted on escorting be to the correct dock .....

....... where I discovered there were only 3 boats a day and that I had missed the early boat and the next didn't leave until 2:30. Probably for the better, now I would relax in Grado for a few hours. So I went door a swim, had lunch, did some work on my iPad, and watched some good tennis ....

............and explored the village discovering the fishing fleet ....

....... before zipping off promptly at 2:30.

........... Just a moment now for a side bar about boating in this part of the world .... and something about the etiquette and rules ....... there aren't any. Especially in Venice where everyone would peal out as fast as whatever HP they had would take them throwing up a huge wake. All of this created a big and constant chop on the water in the main channels. A "no wake zone" like in Booth Bay harbor would be a joke!

But the shoreline totally made up of stone abutments that were .centuries old was able to handle the pounding and the boats, mostly long, low and narrow with a lot of weight up in the bow just plowed through the chop............except for the gondolas which usually stayed in the sheltered back canals ........ or these guys, clearly in over their heads .....

I tried to figure out the rules of the road but there didn't seem to be any. To me it seemed like total chaos. It all worked out though and nobody collided or seemed to get upset. I mostly rode on boats like the 2 on the left below which were a shuttle service run by the municipal government, very inexpensive and efficient with payment seeming to be optional ..... another example of socialism at its best, working much better than free enterprise ever would.

I digress ...... So back to the trip to Trieste. The boat was privately run and really fancy, like a millionaires version of the Mirambo. I met the captain and he was an old salt. There were only 2 bikes on board and this is my Helen parked next to the captains stylish ride ....

........ and a picture of another happy old sailor on board .....

The trip went by quickly and this is a shot of us headed into Trieste .......

.........and the grand city plaza right on the harbor when we arrived. I was told by the captain and several others on board that Trieste was a city worth seeing and since it was already 4:00 I decided to stay another night in Italy and not head out to a foreign country until tomorrow.

I went straight to the information office and easily found a nice modest inexpensive B&B for the night right in town.

This is a photo of the back garden area where Helen spent the night ....

Inspirred by the fishing fleet I saw in Grado earlier in the day I had my last dinner in Italy, but one of the best, an Italian version of a fishermans plater, an assortment of broiled fresh fish with homemade pasta, fresh tomatoes, basil and parmagone. I went to bed early ready to travel behind the old Communist Iron curtain into Moldavia tomorrow.