June 12-14 Sat-Mon. Venice!!!

Our last dinner at Radicondoli was at home, with Russell doing a fabulous job on the woodfired BBQ with much support from Fred and Bruce, while the girls found that the oven did great roasties, so with a yummy salad and all the bits and pieces from the fridge it was ample sufficiency. Mary topped the meal off with tasty treats from the local bakery which went very well with the dessert wine.( so many meringue type sweeties here- I know they have a particular name but it just escapes me now)
Saturday morning Jess and Bruce shopped at the bakery for a blow-out brekkie of deliciously sugary donuts, chocolate and custard croissants and apricot pastries. Mmmmmmm a great start for the day.

We were all well organised, so after farewells we were away in good time and for us, a straightforward drive through to Sienna to catch the Regionale Train to Florence. I had some concerns about connecting with our host and finding our accommodation in Venice so we made a phone call and were reassured that she was expecting us and we should phone her on arrival in Venice.

Yeehah; we’d found the right station, the right platform, the right carriage, our accommodation was confirmed, so ticket back in pocket and we were off on our next adventure! But, it would have been good idea to check which Florence station to leap off at and not assume that the first time we saw “Florence” we should leap! But Freddie was on to it, immediately realising we’d made an ooopsie,so we dashed to the information office and were directed to another train which thankfully got us to the station we needed in time for our connection.

Florence to Venice was on the fast train. Wow what a great way to travel just floating along and so fast! I felt I should be making a great effort to study the countryside we were whizzing through but after several very long tunnels the warmth and the motion won and I was asleep.

Then suddenly we were crossing the lagoon from the mainland to the fairytale city of Venice! Following our host’s instructions, from the railway station we hopped aboard the No 1 Vaporetta (the boat “buses” which transport people up and down the Grande Canal) and then jumped off again two stops later. We also bought a 24 hour Vaporetta ticket to use later. We waited a little while for her to meet us as arranged but then realised we could easily find the address which was very close by. Success.

But all did not proceed smoothly. Our accommodation orientation halted abruptly when the lights blew in our bedroom (bedroom = pseudonym for cupboard) and despite her very best efforts she couldn’t get the problem sorted (5.00 Saturday afternoon just too hard to get an electrician in Venice!). Fortunately she and her Mum obviously had good contacts in the hospitality industry and soon came up with an alternative where we were shortly ensconced.

What to do in Venice at 6.00pm Sat night when one has just settled in? What else but grab the travel guide and take a Grand Canal vaporetto ride from whoa to go! This is by far the best way to orientate yourself here and also to soak up the fabulous sights and sounds of the City; the ornate grandeur and beauty of the four and five storey buildings lining the canal, the side canals branching off here and there showing glimpses of narrow cobbled streets, humpbacked bridges (something like 420 throughout the City) and washing on the clotheslines beneath people’s windows. Here and there a dining terrace sits out over the water and down towards St Marco Piazza there is some flat paved area along the Canal, packed with outdoor dining areas from the restaurants crammed here. The many vaporetto ply back and forth between the stops, with immaculate, gorgeous, black, highly decorated gondolas gliding between (prohibitively expensive though well patronised). Our return trip was in the dark with glittering chandeliers lighting the palaces and homes and lights along the canal shimmering on the water and all accompanied by the gentle slop, slop of waves and wake lapping the buildings and bridges.

Sunday morning we woke none too early – probably because our accommodation was as dark and silent as a dungeon. However our dungeon had a hard but big bed, a comparatively large bathroom and a few handy extras like an electric jug. We’d noticed a supermarket the previous night and were stocked with goodies for breakfast and lunch so were soon out heading for the Rialto market and particularly a walk over the beautiful Rialto Bridge. The market struck us as a bit frenetic so we took the next vaporretto down to the Accademia Gallery; what a huge collection of wonderful artworks here!

Our travel guide highly recommended the church of San Sebastian for its artworks too, so we jumped aboard a boat to make our way there. Obviously we got the wrong one but did a wonderfully interesting trip past the Gondola Service Centre, a bunch of super yachts and a couple of cruise , before getting back on track and arriving at Sam Sebastian. We had been warned that Italian opening times sometimes seem to have their own rules and sad to say the church wasn’t open.

Hungry and needing to rest our feet from pavement pounding (or is that cobblestone capering) we hopped aboard again for the Gardens. We really enjoyed this lovely place. Big shady trees, nice lawns, garden seats, jasmine flowering everywhere and so many families enjoying a relaxed Sunday afternoon – the children playing at the playground and the Dad’s asleep on the park benches looking after the buggies!
Just across the water from the Gardens is a small island taken up by an old monastery with its church San Giorgio Maggiore boasting a tall belfry which locals insist offers the best view of Venice. It seemed a great idea to nip over there right now rather than queue and pay much more to go up St Marco’s campanile for a view. We were thrilled with the view from here and scared witless when the bell tolled while we were up there –thank goodness it was just one chime on the half hour, not twelve for 12 o’clock!

From here we made our way to Salute the magnificently ornate Basilica and iconic sight that greats travellers as they enter the Grand Canal. Built in thanks for the end of the plague which wiped out a hug proportion of the Cities population, a million wooden piles were pounded into the marshy ground to support the weight of this fantastic building!

From here we walked back past the Guggenheim Gallery feeling too worn out to visit but did pop into the beautiful Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, a lovely basilica built for the Franciscan Friars. I've been really taken by how so many of these old, old churches which in many way are like museum pieces are so obviously still so used and loved by their congregations with gorgeous floral arrangements of fresh flowers and candles burning.

6.00 o,clock and high time to sit on the sidewalk at a little restaurant with a wine and watch the activity. Best sight was the fisherman dashing into the restaurant to hand deliver 2 very large bags of fresh clams (cockles) and within 2 minute Grandpa from next door arriving in just his pyjama pants to collect his share. Second best was the huge thunder storm with hail, which saw people either drenched or sheltering.
The clams had whett my appetite fo seafood so dinner was a seafood rissotto though unfortunately pretty heavy on the salt which is a trend we've noticed several times here.

Monday 14th was our day to tackle St Marco Piazza, Basilica, Palace and Museum so we headed out early. On arrival the queue was 100 metres plus, so we paid the money and took a guided tour offering. Money well spent! Within 5 minutes we were high above the doors of the Basilica looking out over the buzz of the Piazza to the two huge granite columns of St Mark and St Theodore and watching the bell on the Torre dell'Orologio strike 10.00. For an hour our guide lead us around and reeled off a constant banter fascinating facts and figures. My favourites were about the 2000 year old bronze horses and the fact that the magnificent golden mosaic ceiling of the Basilica was 8500 sq metres and took 800 years to complete - that's a very big jigsaw!!! Also, that the tiled floor used 820 different types of marble!
The adjoining palace, (Dogue's Ducal) was awesome! The gold gilded ceilings of the staircase were breathtaking (in fact ceiling decoration throught the Ducal is mind boggling) and the extensive collection of exhibits in the Museo Civico Correr including weapons, artworks was very interesting.

Overload! Museumed and churched out, so leapt aboard a vaporetto and out to Burano Island where I was keen to look at the exquisite lace work and Fred the quaint and colourful houses.

Late dinner (but dinner is always late in Italy - 8.30 has been our norm but this was 9.30) so with the Italy/Slovakia World Cup Soccer game bringing the streets to a halt we popped into the restaurant nearest to our accomodation and ended up having the best bought meal of our trip to date. I'd been hoping to try a Spaghetti Bolognese in Bologna and here was one on the menu so that was my choice while Fred had Spaghetti Carbonara; both delicious!