Venezia

The Grand Canal



Paris, Summer, Ruthie and Stephen



Grand Canal, Rialto



Basilica San Marco





Around San Marco Piazza



Rialto Bridge

View from San Marco Campanile, a city built on water

Summer, Ruthie, Stephen and Paris at Campo San Giacomo dell 'Orio

Isola di San Gorgio Maggiore

Grand Canal

Tulips, Lido Island

San Teodoro, San Marco Piazza



Lion symbol for San Marco, San Marco Piazza



Doge Palace

Doge Palace

Campanile, San Marco

Paris, Summer and Ruthie at San Marco Piazza

Campanille, San Marco Piazza

San Marco Basilica

Altar, San Marco Basilica

Grand Canal from Rialto Bridge at night

Rialto Market

Paris (Summer & Stephen partially hidden) Rialto Market

Renowned mask maker shop, Rialto



Giacomo di Rialto church, 421 A.C., with a 24 hour clock



Ruthie and Paris, leaving our hotel alley

Gelato!

Local pasta

Paris, Summer and Ruthie at San Marcos Piazza

Bridge, Ponte dell' Accademia

Artist, Campo San Moise

Rialto Bridge at night

Vista from the Camponile

"White swan of cities slumbering in thy nest . . . White phantom city, whose untrodden streets Are rivers, and whose pavements are the shifting Shadows of the palaces and strips of sky." --Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "Venice"


"Venice is like eating an entire box of chocolate liqueurs in one go." --Truman Capote



We thought we saved the best until last, and we were right. We went on an eight day trip split between Venice and Rome. This blog entry is on the first half of the trip, which was in Venice. This is predictably our favorite European city. What makes it so is the visual beauty,the cobblestone streets, old buildings, and there are no cars! You either get around by feet or by boat, crossing or going under bridges everywhere. That makes it unique. Add some great Italian food, and what else could you want? I have so many good photos of the city, yet I already yearn to return on a photography sojourn. I can see why Monet loved the city.

Venice has been described as the ''City of Water", "City of Masks", "City of Bridges", "The Floating City", and "City of Canals" and as "undoubtedly the most beautiful city built by man".  It has also been described as being one of Europe's most romantic cities.Venice is built on an archipelago of 117 islands formed by 177 canals in a shallow lagoon, connected by 409 bridges.

The Republic of Venice was a major maritime power during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and a staging area for the Crusades, as well as a very important center of commerce (especially silk, grain and spice trade) and art in the 13th century up to the end of the 17th century. This made Venice a wealthy city throughout most of its history.  It is also known for its several important artistic movements, especially the Renaissance period. Venice has played an important role in the history of symphonic and operatic music, and it is the birthplace of Antonio Vivaldi.


We flew into the airport on the mainland, and took a short train ride on a causeway, to the islands of Venice. The city is bisected by a curvy Grand Canal, which is busy with boats of all sizes. We took the commonest form of public transport, the Vapparatto, on the canal to our first apartment, located in the Cannaregio sestiere. The city is divided into six areas or "sestiere". These are Cannaregio, San Polo, Dorsoduro, Santa Croce, San Marco and Castello. At the front of the gondolas that work in the city there is a large piece of metal intended as a likeness of the Doge's (the Doge was the elected magistrate of Venice) hat. On this sit six notches pointing forwards and one notch pointing backwards. Each of these six notches represent one of the Sestiere.

We had a nice apartment which was more like a house. It was located in the Cannaregio sestiere. We were in an enclosed, private courtyard, surrounded by multistory houses.The kitchen windows opened onto a canal, so when you would hear motors, you could gaze out at the passing water taxis, which were built like the beautiful wooden Chris Craft from Seattle. If you only heard voices, you knew it was a gondola (human powered) passing by. Also, outside the apartment, there was a door, with 2 steps down to the canal. As I stood there on the steps shooting pictures, a gondolier shouted in Italian, what I can imagine he said was 'watch your step!'

We found the pizza excellent, and affordable for our four hungry teens. Paris brought a friend Ruthie, a Stanwood, WA. classmate, who came to Ireland and Italy on her Spring break. She is a bright, energetic teen. One type of pizza had 3 cheeses: provolone, Gorgonzola and Brie. The kids also loved gelato, 2 scoops in a cone. Favorite flavors included chocolate, mint, pistachio, coconut and mango.

Early morning, I would get up and wander the quiet cobblestone streets of Venice, photographing piazzas and old churches. The working boats would be active, stopping at the stores and unloading goods. Evenings, Ruthie, Paris and I would hop on a vaparroto, get off a few stops down the Grand Canal, and get lost in a sestiere, inevitable seeing quiet piazzas, small cafes in  alleys, and dimly lit buildings along the way. The weather was perfect, in the 70s (that's low 20's for our Irish followers). All of the walking areas in Venice are cobblestone, some ancient.

From Wikipedia: The buildings of Venice are constructed on closely spaced wood piles, which were imported from the mainland. (Under water, in the absence of oxygen, wood does not decay. It is petrified as a result of the constant flow of mineral-rich water around and through it, so that it becomes a stone-like structure.) The piles penetrate a softer layer of sand and mud until they reach the much harder layer of compressed clay. Wood for piles was cut in the most western part of today's Slovenia.  Most of these piles are still intact after centuries of submersion. The foundations rest on the piles, and buildings of brick or stone sit above these footings. The buildings are often threatened by flood tides pushing in from the Adriatic between autumn and early spring.

Piazza San Marco (often known in English as St Mark's Square) is the highlight of Venice. I have used Wiki to describe some attributes of this area. It is a rare square in Europe where the sound of human voices is heard instead of the sounds of traffic. The principle buildings of the square have not changed for centuries. The church has a beautiful facade with its great arches and marble decoration, the Romanesque carvings round the central doorway and, above all, the four horses which preside over the whole piazza and are such potent symbols of the pride and power of Venice that the Genoese in 1379 said that there could be no peace between the two cities until these horses had been bridled and, four hundred years later, Napoleon, after he had conquered Venice, had them taken down and shipped to Paris.
  We went to the open end of the Piazza marked by two large granite columns carrying symbols of the two patron saints of Venice. The first is Saint Theodore, who was the patron of the city before St Mark, holding a spear and with a crocodile to represent the dragon which he was said to have slain.  The second column has a creature representing the winged lion which is the symbol of St Mark. This has a long history, probably starting as a winged lion-griffin on a monument to the god Sandon at Tarsus in Cilicia (Southern Turkey) about 300 BC. I have so many lion statue photos from our trips across Europe that I am tempted to do a photo assay on them. The columns are thought to have been erected about 1268, when the water was closer and they would have been on the edge of the lagoon, framing the entry to the city from the sea. Gambling was permitted in the space between the columns and public executions also took place between the columns.

The Piazza San Marco is not far above sea level and during the Acqua Alta, the "high water" from storm surges from the Adriatic or heavy rain, it is quick to flood. Water pouring into the drains in the Piazza runs directly into the Grand Canal. This normally works well but, when the sea is high, it has the reverse effect, with water from the lagoon surging up into the Square.

We toured Doge's Palace, which is next to San Marco Basilica. Built in the 1300's, then re designed during the Renaissance, it has some old prison rooms, where the kid's imagination ran wild. A famous inmate was Giacomo Casanova, who escaped. As well as being the ducal residence, the palace housed political institutions of the Republic of Venice until the Napoleonic occupation of the city in 1797. Venice was ruled by an aristocratic elite, but there was a facility for citizens to submit written complaints at what was known as the Bussola chamber. The kids enjoyed the weapons room, featuring lances and crossbows. San Marco Basilica was quite impressive on the outside, and the church alter is built over on Saint Mark's tomb. We made a quick trip inside, seeing the main interior, deciding not to pay to go into some of the other rooms.

Next, we crossed the San Marco Piazza, to the Campanile which is the bell tower to San Marco Basilica. The Campanile  was built in 1156, then rebuilt in 1912 ' com'era, dov'era ' (as it was, where it was) after a spectacular crashing demise.  There are five bells, some ring multiple times daily, heard thru out Venice. Each of the five bells of the campanile had a special purpose. The Renghiera  announced executions; the Mezza Terza proclaimed a session of the Senate; the Nona sounded midday; the Trottiera called the members of the Maggior Consiglio to council meetings and the Marangona , the biggest, rang to mark the beginning and ending of working day. The belfry is topped by a cube, alternate faces of which show the Lion of St. Mark and the female representation of Venice (la Giustizia: Justice). The tower is capped by a pyramidal spire, at the top of which sits a golden weathervane in the form of the archangel Gabriel.  Later replicas include the clock tower at King Street Station in Seattle. We took the elevator up over 300 feet to the viewing area, and we were rewarded by panoramic views of Venice. Galileo demonstrated his telescope here in 1609.

Here we were in Venice, with all its glorious sites, and the kids insisted on going elsewhere, to a beach. We took the Vapparatto (a great water trip for 6.50 euros each) to the nearby island of Lido, known as the "Golden Island", famous for its Adriatic Sea beach, and the Venice Film Festival. We walked across the island, to the beach. The weather was great, so the kids swam and soaked up some sun. My mom cut her foot on glass here years ago, so the kids were diligent as there was an occasional piece of glass seen in the sand.

We saw a lot of beautiful masks in the shops. Paris bought a few for her friends. There is a  Carnival for 2 weeks in March, where everyone wears a mask. Carnival started as a time for celebration and expression throughout the classes, as wearing masks hid any form of identity between social classes. A Bauta mask covers the whole face, with a stubborn chin line, no mouth, and lots of gilding. One may find masks sold as Bautas that cover only the upper part of the face from the forehead to the nose and upper cheeks, thereby concealing identity but enabling the wearer to talk and eat or drink easily. It tends to be the main type of mask worn during the Carnival. It was used also on many other occasions as a device for hiding the wearer's identity and social status. Historically, it would permit the wearer to act more freely in cases where he or she wanted to interact with other members of the society outside the bounds of identity and everyday convention. It was thus useful for a variety of purposes, some of them illicit or criminal, others just personal, such as romantic encounters.  In 18th century, the Bauta had become a standardized society mask and disguise regulated by the Venetian government.  It was obligatory to wear it at certain political decision-making events when all citizens were required to act anonymously. Only citizens had the right to use the Bauta. Its role was similar to the anonymizing processes invented to guarantee general, direct, free, equal and secret ballots in modern democracies. Also, a long nosed mask was worn by doctors during plagues, its cavity filled with perfumed herbs to filter the diseased air.

We six piled into a gondola for a relaxing trip thru the narrow waterways and part of the Grand Canal. We saw a house where Mozart stayed and, incidentally, Venice was home to Vivaldi. Venice has restricted the gondola licences to around four hundred. It is estimated that there were eight to ten thousand gondolas during the 17th and 18th century.The boat is around 25 feet long, with a flat bottom. The canal water depth is 1-4 meters. There used to be a small cabin, to protect the passengers from the weather or from onlookers. Its windows could be closed with louvered shutters—the original "venetian blinds". The oar or rèmo is held in an oar lock known as a fórcola. The forcola is of a complicated shape, allowing several positions of the oar for slow forward rowing, powerful forward rowing, turning, slowing down, rowing backwards, and stopping. The ornament on the front of the boat is called the fèrro (meaning iron) and can be made from brass, stainless steel, or aluminium. It serves as decoration and as counterweight for the gondolier standing near the stern. There is a custom painted decoration that faces the passengers.The left side of the gondola is made longer than the right side. This asymmetry causes the gondola to resist the tendency to turn toward the left at the forward stroke.The gondoliers know their stuff, typically necessary in the tight spaces of Venetian canals. They frequently use their oar for rowing (solo canoe style) and often use one foot to push off of building walls. We saw one gondolier get hot when a young power boat skipper almost crashed into him. In August 2010, Giorgia Boscolo became Venice's first female gondolier. We have a few photos (see 4th photo from top) of a female gondolier, which could be her.

Our second apartment was in the San Marco sestiere, a couple blocks from the famed Rialto Bridge, built in 1588. Marco Polo was born (in 1254) a few blocks from this bridge. Important for the kids, there was great pizza and gelato ice cream nearby. Also, lots of shops. The main market for Venice is in the Rialto area, where everyone comes for their fresh produce, and fish. The kids were fascinated by the exotic looking fish for sale. Nearby is the Giacomo di Rialto, a church  It is believed to be the oldest church in the city, built in the year 421. It survived a fire in the Rialto in the early 16th century. It is notable for the large 15th century 24 hour clock above the entrance.

One comment on travelling to Venice. I literally spent hours researching the locations of our aapartments in Venice before the trip, and I still got both locations wrong. The Italian web sites are not great in their directions. That said, both apartments were in good areas. You can hardly go wrong staying anywhere in Venice.

Some interesting facts about Venice:

• St. Marks holds relics of Christ
• San Marcos Plaza has seen 6 feet of flood water, and also 100,000 spectators for a Pink Floyd concert
• facades can only be repaired, by law, with plaster, which immediately starts crumbling due to the humidity and salty air, giving the photogenic, crumbling building appearances
• 68,000 people live in Venice, and one in every two families own a boat
• Lions are the symbol of Venice and of St Mark, often depicted with 2 paws in the water and 2 paws on land, symbolic of Venice
• Murano glass is from an island adjacent to Venice
• By 1303, crossbow practice had become compulsory in the city
• In the 14th century, many young Venetian men began wearing tight-fitting multicoloured hose, the designs on which indicated the Compagnie della Calza ("Trouser Club") to which they belonged.
• Words originating in Venice: Arsenal, Ciao, Ghetto, Gondola, Imbroglio, Lagoon, Lazaret, Lido, Montenegro, Quarantine.
• The word regatta came from Venice, and there is an annual regatta on the Grand Canal

Our experiences in Venice were wonderful. I highly recommend that you see it in your lifetime. It is our favorite European city. Next travel blog: Rome.