The harsh reality of owning property in Venice didn’t really hit me until we had signed all the documents with the Notary in Padua, he read the entire sale and purchase agreement in Italian and then in English, we initialed and signed in all the relevant places.

We then caught the train back over the causeway and a vaporetto slowly down the Grand Canal taking in all the beautiful medieval buildings, excited to now be able to spend some serious time in this fabulous city.

We finally got back to Cannaregio and spent a couple of hours trying to find the place and it was then that I saw the outside of the building through different eyes.

OMG. Will it fall down? There are so many cracks and shonky looking repairs. Bits crumbling off. Bits covered in moss and mould. A drain coming out of the ancient wall-draining from where exactly? An ancient, rusty metal bracket that seemed to be holding up the entire bathroom.

The main door was of course at ground level and all the electrics for the building were just inside at eye level, the stair rail was rusty. It was clear that with the canal so close that when even a small aqua alta came this area would be flooded. What have we done?!

Well, what we had done was purchase a property in the most beautiful city on the planet. A property that had managed to stay upright since 1700. A property with more history than we from the new world could even understand. The beauty of course is in the history and looking down the canal from our Juliette balcony we were now right in the middle of it.