Travelling through Europe, one clinic at a time: December 2015

We head on to Trieste. As we’ve promised to meet Vallo at Venice by 26.10, we won’t have time to visit Slovenia. We just drive through it much like Bosnia a few days back. No country should be left unvisited and all of them have vet clinics to go to, but unfortunately my last veterinary contact was 10 days ago in Athens. In Macedonia, Montenegro or Croatia no vet clinics crossed our path. To be honest there was one in Croatia, Crikvenica but it was closed. I am worried the veterinary aspect of my travels is disappearing. I will have to revive it in Italy.
We catch a train to Venice from Trieste.

When we arrive, it is already dark.

Silvia buys a waterproof map of the city - a very good idea. Our hotel is relatively far from the train station, but Silvia thinks of herself as an extraordinary guide so we should not be worried. For a while we end up taking a detour of half an hour and arrive at our hotel half an hour later, but we see a lot of Venice on the way.

The hotel is beautiful. Vallo has already arrived. Looking for a place to eat, we find a noisy place and decide to stay there. We can’t really converse as we have to yell, but we try. The food is delicious.

Silvia later writes in her blog that she had the most amazing ravioli.

We’ll stay in Venice for one more night, but we have to switch hotels.

The new place has a tiny dog at the reception area.

Naturally it is revealed that I am a veterinarian. The receptionist places the dog on the counter and reports its’ medical history as I inspect spots that are said to itch. A casual inspection of the dog leads me to believe we are dealing with an atopic. The owner agrees and talks of how a Finnish veterinarian who stayed at the hotel did acupuncture on the dog and how it made the dog feel so much better. He shows me exactly which places were pressed and how. I think to myself, it must have been Anna Hjelm-Börkman, Finland’s finest acupuncture specialist. My curiosity gets the best of me and I call Anna. She hasn’t visited Venice lately but says it could have been her colleague Netta Tammisalo. Well that’s something veterinary in Venice! Finding a clinic is said to be impossible because all of them are out of the city center.

Unquestionably we will have to go to the main square of Venice.

An enormous line spreads before the church but the queue at Doge’s palace seems to move quickly. The palace is definitely a sight to see and worth the wait. This is all later recollection as I didn’t write when our impressions were fresh. Now I look at the pictures and try to remember what we saw and heard.

I remember:

1. Us trying to find Estonia on some ancient maps and found it.

2. A painting of all the Doge’s of Venice has one who looks exactly like V.I. Lenin.

3. An exhibition of many different weapons.

4. Crossing the Bridge of Sighs.

5. Seeing a wonderful mosaic floor in the Basilica of St. Mark.

An unfortunate picture of the old map, but we did find Estonia on it.

Second from the left - the Doge who looks like Lenin

Last three: a huge firearms and weapons collection

A picture taken on the bridge of sighs. Silvia was taking pictures of the tourists who were taking pictures of the bridge of sighs.

Mosaic floor in the Basilica of St. Mark.

We spend hours in the palace. As we are leaving it seems that the church is completely empty and we finally have a chance to go inside. Then we have a light meal at a restaurant just on the next street and I try to find out who the Finnish doctor who cured the receptionist’s dog was.

We clearly go overboard with our little walk as we find ourselves in a hospital somewhere at one point.

At first it looked like we were in some kind of glass gallery but suddenly there were signs in Italian leading to cardiology and gynecology offices. As we tried to escape the labyrinth of hallways it seemed we only got ourselves deeper and deeper into the maze.

When we finally found a doorway that lead outside the hospital walls, it was already dark. We exit the building and find ourselves on the quay.

Looking at the map we seem to be at the edge of the waterproof paper. There is nowhere to go. This is where the island ends, along with all of Venice.

There is only a market next to the dock. We do some grocery shopping and start finding our way back to the hotel. We are very tired and very much wanting to get there already. Too exhausted to even look around.

But at the moment I raise my gaze I see a sign that reads ‘veterinary clinic’ (in Italian). “Stop! Wait here. Give me the camera. I’m going in.” The others collapse to sit down on the sidewalk.

And so I find myself visiting a vet clinic in Venice that shouldn’t even exist according to the locals. The clinic is small.

The veterinarian Francesco Pilan does not speak any English. But we find our ways to communicate - body language, Google translate and Facebook.

Once again I come across our lovely Spotchem biochemic machine. Francesco tells me he works a lot less now, as he’s had a stroke recently. A few colleagues come around from time to time who act as consultants and receive patients.

No time for longer stories. There's a language barrier and tired comrades outside the door. Anyways Francesco becomes a friend of mine on Facebook. I constantly see his posts which I can’t understand but are a nice reminder of a colleague in Venice.

Vallo is sitting on the ground outside with the girls. Mother is gone again on her vet clinic adventures and poor dad has to console the children.

We finally drag ourselves to the hotel. Vallo and I are happy, we open a wine and cut some cheese, as we have no plans of going anywhere anymore. The girls have decided to go on a late tour of Venice titled something like “The Ghost Stories of Venice” or “The Horrors of Venice”. They’ve already payed for the tickets so out in the cold they go. They return very late and tell us stories of what they heard the next morning.