housesitting in venice

In the summer of 2018 I decided to try housesitting for the very first time. I have been a member of House Carers since 2016, so I decided it was about time to try it out. I checked out some of the housesit notifications on the members' page, and ended up with a deal to housesit for a nice woman in Venice who needed someone to look after her Airbnb outlet for a week while she was on holiday in Britain. She had already had an American woman there for one month, but this other woman had to leave earlier than planned, so she needed someone tho housesit for the last week of her holiday. 
I was really excited and thought it was a great opportunity, so after having checked flights and found that they matched perfectly, I booked my tickets and flew off to Venice in the middle of August.

I had never been there before, but the house owner sent me a lot of useful information about how to get to her apartment from the airport, and with the help of Google Maps on my cellphone and an exact route description, I had no problem finding it. It took me only 15-20 mintues to walk there from the bus station, and when I reached the front door of the house where the aparment was and rang the bell, I felt a rush of excitement when I heard a cheerful voice on the intercom by the door. It was Sally, the American woman. 
She would be leaving the next day, but was waiting for me to arrive so she could show me everything I needed to know in order to take care of the Airbnb outlet in the best possible way.

Sally was nice, the apartment was nice, and I just knew that my week in Venice would be great. Sally showed me the local grocery shop and market, and also left me a very useful street map and guide and gave me some useful tips about some galleries and other interesting venues, along with some practical information about the vaporetto fares etc. In the evening we went to a very cosy restaurant in the neighbourhood, where we had a nice conversation over a delicious lasagna and some dessert, before we decided to call it a day and head back to the apartment. Sally had still a few things to pack and would be leaving early in the morning, and I had been up at the crack of dawn and was a bit tired after my journey, so we said goodnight early and went to bed. I slept on the couch in the living-room that first night, since Sally was still occupying the main bedroom, but when she had left the next morning, I could install myself in there with the few belongings I had brought with me.  It was a nice room with an ajoining bathroom, so I didn't have to share bathroom with the Airbnb guests, which was nice.

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