Venice: An Excellent 5 Day Escape
by Tab Hauser
(photo by Tab Hauser)
Below is a log of our 5 day visit to Venice at the end of October in 2003. This is my of view of Venice and includes places we saw, ate and stayed as well as anything that came to mind we did. (For those 2000+ of you have hit my web site in the last 18 months, thanks. Even more thanks to the email I have gotten thanking me for some tip I had or even adding one of your own. A special thanks to the few that told me I should get my own show on the travel network. That was a hoot to read. Also forgive me on the grammatical errors. English was not a major in College.) I also want to thank the people on the web forums who helped me with ideas.
Venice for the most part has been a tourist town for the last couple of hundred years. It is one place where one can not or does not need to blend in with the locals. This is because there are only 60,000 locals and millions of tourists. According to what a few “locals” told me in Venice, the term “local” is getting harder and harder to come by. Even the people living in this magnificent city are getting scarce because it is getting too expensive to live in there. Many now take the boat or train it into work. In fact we read somewhere that the government has been subsidizing the cost of rent in many cases to keep people here but we had not further details on this I was told there are a couple of neighborhoods where the tourists do not get to that often but you would have to wander out if you really wanted to. We found a bar out of the way behind some small street in a back alley that was mostly for locals and yet there were 3 ladies from the Midwest having some inexpensive bar food and wine. Personally I do not think any of this matters in Venice. Perhaps when in Rome do as the Romans do, when in Venice, you do what you like but get off the more worn walkways and venture into the back area.
We had a great time here and being in one place for 5 days got us to see more than the 5 highlights you read about. We know people who were on bus tours and got to “do” Venice in 6 hours. If you stay here less that a few days I can honestly say you missed the boat (no pun intended for this city in the water). I can also say safely that being here for 5 days still did not get us to wander a few sections we would have liked to.
Venice is a very easy city to get around. All you need is a good map and a half decent sense of direction. Those reading the maps should know that Venice is small. You can walk from just about one end to the other in an hour. It takes 15 to 20 minutes to get from St Mark’s to Rialto and perhaps 15 minutes to the Academia Bridge. When you study a the map it places look farther apart at first glance. It is after you look at the maps scale that you realize how close things are. If you are not into walking, you can buy a 1, 3 or 7 day vaporetto pass. Vaporettos are fun and efficient buses on the water. We bought the 3 day, did not use it the second day and did not bother buying one for the few stops we took it on for the 4th day. (We never saw anyone check tickets, but if you are checked and you do not have a ticket it is $30E fine.).
It is hard to get lost using the vaporetto system. Also, when you walk to important places like the bridges or many vaporetto stops you can frequently see small signs with arrows pointing the way. Traveling here as a single, couple or small group on your own is easy.I would not recommend doing the bus tour thing with 30 people as the streets are small. It is real easy to learn about the places you visit with the audio guides or smaller walking tours. Audio guides are available from the tourist office as well as at many museums. Also, there are so many guide books you can follow along. I picked up Steve Reeve’s Venice 2004. I never used his books in the past and figured this was a good time to try this guide. He makes things simple with small drawn out maps of many of the popular places. If you are one that feels only comfortable in large bus tours than find a company that offers radios everyone in the group. What we saw in a few groups had the group slinging around a small radio around their neck with an ear piece while the guide spoke into a microphone. The nice thing about this is that the group did not have to huddle over the guide while they were talking in the narrow streets or through the crowds at St. Marks.
We stayed at the Hotel AlbergoCavalletto and Doge Orseolo that was behind St Marks. We picked this because of the large discount given and the fact they guaranteed a balcony over looking the canal at room 1458. The room and balcony actually sounds better that it was. We were 5 floors up over where 20 gondolas would line up for their tours as well as park overnight. If you looked straight down you saw where the gondolas were parked and staged for the rides otherwise the view was boring looking at some roof tops and abandon buildings across the way over the shops. There was nothing romantic about the view. We were also in between seasons so there was no A/C and because we were on the top floor our room was always hot. When we went for our 4PM nap and left the balcony door open to cool the room you would hear the loud gondoliers and their 2 assistants settling what sounded like the affairs of state. Two other problems with this hotel (part of the several Best Western Hotels in Venice) were that the beds were pretty hard and the breakfast included was sub value. The fruit was canned, the juice from a machine that tasted worst than Tang. Also the few pastries served came in plastic wrappings that you would see an Italian style grocery store in the States. We paid 50% off at $200E per night. I was told this was not a bad price for the type of hotel and location. I think one of the best ways these days to check out a hotel before going would be some of the different web forums as well as recent guide books. From here you can price a hotel to your budget. In the future, I would consider splurging a little more and staying at a recommend smaller inn..
Lastly, when entering Venice I would splurge on the “Grand Entrance”. This means passing on the water bus and taking a water taxi in. (perhaps you can meet someone on the plane that may want to share a ride with you and split the $80E) I read on the various web forums on Venice that the water taxi is an impressive way to see Venice for the first time. I am glad we did this. We came in via a canal just above the Rialto Bridge and went under it, slowly winding our way to the St Marks dock because the high tide did not allow the taxi under some low bridges to our dock. Pictures and movies do not do the entrance you make on the water taxi justice. If you are on a budget there are other ways to make up the difference between the water bus costing $20E for two people verse the $80E on the taxi.
Now to our days…
Day 1- Delta Business Elite (a first class) direct from N.Y. to Venice on the overnight 8PM flight was very nice. It was good that for a change we were actually able to use mileage at the time we wanted to. I spent the 1st half of the flight looking at travel info I collected on Venice while being wined and dined finishing up with a hot fudge sundae, some desert wine and an ambien sleeping pill to help with the last 4 hours of the flight.
(ambien I find is a great “sleep inducer” and jet lag helper with no side effects. I also use ambien to correct jet lag in the middle of the 2nd night when I am wide awake at 3AM)
After our lugging our luggage several minutes from the St Marks Vallaresco dock
we headed off on the to the Jewish Section or Ghetto. We figured Sunday would be
a good day to see this area. Daniel at the front desk recommend we walk to the
Rialto bridge and get on the vaporetto from there because this would save some
time. It was also good to get some exercise after being on a plane 7 hours.
We got off at St. Maruola dock and walked through a few streets until we reached the Jewish Museum which is just off the square. From here we took the 12:30 tour. This included a visit to 3 of the 5 synagogues in the area and the small museum. Venice presently has 500 Jews now, down from 1200 during WW2. Over 240 were sent to the death camps with only 8 returning. There are a few memorial plaques in the area on this. About 25 Jews still live in the former ghetto. It should be noted that the word ghetto came Venice). On any given Sabbath only 10% show up for Friday evening or Saturday AM weekly services but it is a full house on high holidays. Some things never change world wide! What was interesting was that we were a group of about 30. 80% were Jewish, the rest were interested in what happened here and how the Ghetto started in 1516.
Jews were actually in Venice a few hundred years before that but it was March 29th 1516 that the government made laws for Jews to only live in on this island and wear something yellow identifying them as Jewish. Also, they were restricted in the type of work they did. Two things they did do was lend money (because Catholics were not allowed to borrow from one another at that time) as well as become doctors. They were allowed to practice their religion and were granted protection in war. Jews were not allowed to travel at night out of the ghetto. To reinforce this rule the bridges were closed and guarded In the small world department, we met a lady from Atlanta who heard we were from Port.Washington area and told us how she flew up with her search committee to meet the and interview the Rabbi of Community Synagogue which is the other reform temple in our town. It was also interesting to see a bunch of Jewish people from different areas learning about a similar heritage and culture. It should be noted the guide said that it was Napoleon that the Jewish people can thank for tearing down the restrictions of the ghetto when he conquered the city and closed down the Venetian government. (It was made clear to us a few times that Venetians don’t like the French still) The guide also complained that the Jewish Orthodox group Lubbavich were trying to get a foot hold in the area and joked that as Americans we should take them back.
In sticking with the “eat local” theory we had our only non Italian meal here.
We ate a couple of blocks away at a kosher place called Gam Gam (041715284).
Rather than dive into pizza, pasta, paninis, seafood and other it Italian
goodies, we had an Israeli salad platter and 2 latkes or potato pancakes (or at
least their version of them) From here we hopped back on the vaporetto but
this time to the end at St Marks simply because we enjoyed the ride on the
canal.
After a 2 ½ hour nap we headed to Ristorante La Colomba.(0415221175) This place was recommended to us by my parents and was 5 minutes from the hotel. Coincidently it is also some how affiliated with our hotel and offered a 10% discount. I found my appetizer of gnocchi's and main course of John Dory (fish) over simmered or sautéed veggies excellent. Maureen had a house salad and sliced mozzarella over it and as a main course a pasta with mushrooms that she thought was wonderful. Diner with service charge, a bottle of wine and bubbled water was $125E. A little pricier than a L.I. restaurant of its caliber but the food was just as good. (We were also charged an $11E cover for the two of us. Covers are standard for most places here. This is for the bread and privilege to be served I guess)
Day 2- Woke up at 9:30 and had the bland continental breakfast at the hotel We walked around a flooded St Marks square and caught up to Venice Events at the back the bell tower. There we met 15 other people who were taking the morning “Venice Past and Present” walking tour. The price is $20E (you may get minus 15% off if you tell them you want to book it direct and bypass the concierge who generally makes this as a commission.) We were told about St Marks Church and taken inside. Then we were walked out of St Marks and taken to the neighborhood up and to the right of the St Marks area ending up at the entrance to the Arsenale. We enjoyed the tour and found the little alleys and areas taken to a good cheap a good cheap way to break into Venice and feel more comfortable about our surroundings. If I can tell Venice Events one thing it would be to not take us into St Marks as the guide could not speak in there. This would give you 30 minutes to be with the guide else where. We were also hoping for more history of Venice. After the tour we paired up with one couple and walked to Via Garibaldi which is a wide street and found a simple place for an outdoor lunch in the sun and headed to the Isola di S Pietro where we stuck our nose in this big white church and headed back to St Mark’s and our hotel for a late after noon nap.
(looking up in St Marks. Do not use a flash and set camera to 15th second)
Dinner was at Al Cova (041/5223812) which was about a 10 minute walk from the hotel. We chose this place on the recommendation of a friend. Al Cova is run by a Texan named Dianne and her Venetian Chef husband. Everything they say in their kitchen is fresh. They claim they do not use any cans or frozen goods and the taste showed
I had salad and a fried tempura style fisherman’s platter while Maureen had 3 types of anti-pasto meats and a thin sliced steak. We also shared a 1999 Chianti Reserva for $33 (we splurged over the same wine that was a 2000 for $10 less) We chatted with Diane about the food when she came by to see of all was in order. She said my fried platter is a typical Venetian dish. What makes theirs special is that they put the different seafood and fish I ate in ice water for 2 minutes before dusting it with flour and frying it quickly. The batter is very thin and not greasy. For desert Maureen had the cheese platter and I had her old fashion double chocolate cake which she baked herself and calls her comfort food. We also asked her for other recommendations to eat over the next few days and she told us about a group of about a dozen restaurants that share the same belief of cooking and customer care. This group is called “Ristoranti Della Bvuona Accoglienza Venezia”. They are 14 independent restaurants that claim to adhere to certain quality and pricing guidelines. Ask her for the brochure and tell her Tab from Port Washington recommended you.
Lastly, we also ordered an unusual glass Valpolicella desert red wine to share with our desert that she comped us. On top of that she sent a third desert with a birthday candle to celebrate my 45th. Overall this place had excellent service and very good food.
To complete our second day in Venice dinner we strolled down to the St. Marks vaporetto stop and took it to the Rialto bridge and back just for the fun of the boat ride. We were also looking for forward to a night cap at Harry’s bar but saw it was closed at 11:30. All in all, not a bad way to spend a B-day. Great weather, good lighting for pictures and good food.
Day 3
Got up and took the vaporetto to the Rialto bridge to see the fish and fruit market. We got there just before 10AM and walked across the bridge. Rialto is a very pretty bridge that has several stores on it. Across the bridge there are little shops for touristy stuff. Past this and on the right are fruit stands with the fish market behind it. The fish and seafood are set up in the stalls in a very colorful or practical matter with much of the shell fish alive. I enjoyed seeing a 4 year old get a kick out of watching a crab about the size of a golf ball climb up on another, then on a small 4” wall and over on some live eels and out. It was like watching the end of the movie “Finding Nemo” when the fish escaped out of the tank. At another stand they was a huge body of a swordfish that the owner would cut up for steaks. What was interesting was that the head was standing up with the sword or bill of the fish sticking out 2 feet. Talking about a weapon, this thing sharpened a little could do some serious damage.
Afterwards leaving the market we headed back over the bridge to make our way to Fondemonte Nouva vaporetto stop that goes to the glass manufacturing island of Murano. Crossing the bridge back to the east side of the Grand Canal were some shops on carts where we both bought some thin leather gloves to keep our hands warm. Next we made our way through the narrow and medium size walk ways following either a map and seeing the sign now and then. One of the nice things about walking around Venice is simply walking around. It is hard to get really lost if you are not paying attention to the signs. Yes, you can miss a walkway or two and walk around or back track but you are on an island and eventually you will hit water if you mess up big time. As I said, the signs are a big help. For instance going from St Mark’s area to Rialto there are several signs that point the way. Our walk was not too much different to get to Fondemonte. Some “streets” were not much wider that 2 people. On the way over to the stop we did follow the local’s way of life and stopped off at a wine bar called Enoteca Boldrin (0415237859) that specializes in fast food Italian style via small portions. (not fast food as in American Style but the good stuff they serve here). We walked up to a place that had a counter with different food and pastas under it. There was also a small chalk board with several wines by the glass offered. We ordered one portion lasagna and a glass of red wine with a hint of bubbles for about $7E. (This held us as we did not find time or the place to eat on Murano for the 5 hours we were there.)
It was almost 11AM and we were not the only people having a glass of red. In fact, this was one place that there were only a few locals and we were just following their leads.
After our snack we continued about another 10 minutes and caught a boat to Faro. At Faro we avoided the two hustlers at the bus stop trying to get us to go to some factory and walked to the first furnace place on the left. There we saw two men making small glass horses. We continued up the street looking in various stores and making our way up a pretty sidewalk with the canal on the side. At the end of this small canal we walked into a big glass factory on the left before the bridge and priced some expensive pieces but did not buy anything. These people were just a little to “corporate” if you know what I mean. From there we crossed the bridge making our way to the famous glass museum. The museum was interesting and showed glass from different periods. The museum also honors the Museum Pass one could buy that is good a several museums. After the factory we back tracked to find a place to eat but the one place that appealed to us had a bit of wait. Running out of energy we decided to catch a vaporetto to the other side of the island and got off when we saw a sign for glass production. After seeing 3 men making vases we walked into the show room where a British tour was looking at the different inexpensive pieces of glass. One salesman started to talk to us and when it appeared we buyers and not lookers he took us upstairs to the good stuff. There Maureen picked out a beautiful clear piece of molded glass with a blue glass flower on the inside weighing about 6 pounds. We bargained over 20% and got him to throw in a small rooster for a friend our. Being that her piece did not weigh too much we took it with us saving $50E on the freight costs.
Maureen continued her shopping spree with more perfume bottles and trinkets near the vaporetto stop and finally we were on the number 5 which is more or less the express to San Marks.
After a nap for a couple of hours we decided to do what our book said would be fun for dinner. We did what the locals call a pub crawl. This is where you find places that are known as wine bars or places that serve finger food called cicchetti. We walked up to the Rialto area and hit 4 places in the book. The first place was called Rosticceria San Bartolomeo which was a cafeteria style place. We ordered to glasses of red and two fried looking things. The first one was cheese and anchovies and the second was a rolled up sweet potato burrito looking thing. We took a couple of bites of each and tossed them. OK, we did not do so good the first round but then again the whole thing was $5E. We went back to the counter with something safer to try and ordered a delicious creamy piece of lasagna and two more wines. After this we hit a normally looking pub – wine bar. This pub was called Osteria alla Botte. Here we ordered 2 meatballs and 2 potato bacon pieces with 2 different red wines. This place was a lttle crowded but was very good. There were about 15 people crowding around the bar with some tables in the back available. It should be noted if you sit down the food costs more. There were also 3 American ladies standing next to us looking at what to do. We started a conversation and they were doing the pub crawl dinner like us using the same book. We moved on to another great little place that we should have made reservations to eat a sit down dinner at for a later day. This place was called Osteria al Portego (0415229038). He we ordered a fried skewer of zucchini, a small snow crab leg , 1 old fashioned tuna croquette, eggplant parmagian, fried olives stuffed with meet on a skewer. We also ordered one glass of red from the cask that was not good (It was OK for only $.55E) and 2 other reds. Then for the fun of it we tried a glass of pinot grigio from the cask. An Osteria is a term for a small restaurant. Make reservations here to keep it cheap and fun if you want sit down.
The final course was at a stand up desert place called Pasticceria Ponte delle. We got a piece or chocolate and a puff pastry. The pastry was fair. I also tried the “spritz bitter” which is an Italian aperitif or drink to have with desert which I think included Compare, club soda and wine. All I can say on this is Yuch, what a funky taste. Perhaps if I was Italian I may have liked it. Before going to bed we walked back to St Marks and sat in a couple of chairs at a closed coffee shop to people watch in the dimly lit square and talk about another good day in Venice.
Day 4- Off to Doge Palace (pronounced Doe-ge by the locals) for the “secret tour” but the English speaking guide never showed up do to what were told was strike by the bus drivers. After putting our name down for the next days secret tour we were off on the regular tour of almost 2 hours using their cassette tape as a guide. The Doge place should be on the “must see” list because of the history that has taken place here. Venice for the most part was shaped by the Doge from 726AD until 1100 years later when Napoleon conquered the city, ended the error of the Doge’s and put Venice under Austrian rule. The Doge was more or less an elected Duke by his peers. It was a position held for life. With its powers were a series checks and balances to make sure he was not corrupt or would yield too much power. In fact, during votes, the Doge’s vote counted as one and he had to convince the rest of his peers to vote with him on an issue he felt strong about. ( I recommend one reads up on this interesting way of government as I do not want to go into more details here)
The Doge Palace is an important presence next to St Marks Church and was put there because of the closeness between Church and State. The audio tour described the many main rooms and bedroom of the Doge. It is very important to get on the “Secret Tour” . Have your hotel make reservations for you. When we were there they were only able to make them one day in advance. We were a little reluctant to go back to the Doge Palace but we were glad we did. (See next day for info on the Secret Tour.
After Doge Palace it was off to the Accademia Museum but line long so we did Ca’ Rezzonico museum. This is a nice palace with historic art that included works from Canaletto, Guardia and Tiepolo. Besides seeing the art, you get to wander through an old Venetian palace. Allow about 90 minutes to see this place. After we finished here we found a place for a snack, a glass of red wine and some pictures of St Marks.
Tonight was diner and a concert night. We ate at Restaurant Malibran (041 5228028) which was a few minutes away from the Rialto Bridge and from where the concert was. . We had to rush dinner a little because of time but the meal here was very good. After dinner we headed for a place that held concerts. We booked the Vivaldi Concert for about $30E. Every other day they do opera. This was pleasant enough. The music was played by 7 ladies in period garb of white wigs and long puffy flowing dresses. If you like classical music, I would recommend this one or the other company that actually plays it in a Church. You can get information on this at any hotel.
Pretty
Canal Scene
Day 5- It was our last day here and for the most part it was damp and cold. We also decided to cram it a bit. We started by heading to the Doge Palace for our 10AM reserved Secret Tour. The 9:30 was booked and we did not like the fact we would have to wait in the cold lobby for another half hour so we asked (more like politely pleaded with) the tour guide who allowed us to join them. I will not go into too much of the details of this tour because anyone reading this should do it. (It was one of our highlights of the trip.) I will tell you our guide gave us a fascinating history of the Doge’s and how they were elected for live, their live style. We were also told how the government worked and how orderly things ran here compared with the rest of the world. We were taken to hidden or out of the way rooms on the third floor where the government ran affairs as well as the office of Doge. The tour also included stories on Casanova and a visit to the prison cell he was in. For the finally we went into the attic and saw how the roof is held on. I am not carpenter but we were extremely impressed by the way the ship buildings 400 years ago put this second roof on after the fire at the time. As I said, do not avoid this tour. The end of the tour took us past an armory of sorts and out through a secret door in a court room disguised as a closet. From the Doge Palace we walked to Accademia Art Museum just off the Academia Bridge (This is only wooden bridge in Venice with a steel underlining I would imagine to keep it from sagging). It is also the place where there is an Absolute Vodka hanging sign that swayed in the wind to ruin your pictures of it as well as give someone some advertising Euros) Accademia offers a nice audio tour of works from the masters like Titian, Veronese, Bellini, Tintoretto and Giorgione. This place is known for the best collection of Venetian Renaissance art and you get to stoll through another old palace to boot. What is nice about this tour is that you can save a few Euros by renting one cassette player and get a second set of head sets for a less than ½ the price of renting another. Just make sure your partner does not sway more than a meter or one of you is going to get a tug on the head. Accademia also has a capacity crowd. So you may have to wait on line until a few people leave. During the height of the tourist season I would recommend being there 20 minutes before opening or perhaps 90 minutes before closing. In the hour the cassette lasts you get to see lots of religious art. We all have our likes and dislikes in museums. I can safely say after 5 or 6 pieces on religious art I have seen enough. This is even by the greats Titian and Bellini. Don’t get me wrong and no spam please but as amazing as some of these paintings are there is only so many religious scenes I can see. The several works I really liked were pieces showing what life was like 300 or 400 years ago.
Maureen in making up her list of things to see for the day thought it was would be interesting to see where the gondolas were made so we exited out of the door and headed left following the canal and map away from the Grand Canal.
On the way we saw a canal shut down and pumped out. On the bottom of the canal were lose bricks, tires and mud. The workers here were putting new bricks on the walls of the canal and cleaning it up. What surprised me was how deep the canal was. I estimated this section may have been almost 20 feet. Being that most boats in the canal probably drawing 4 or 5 feet I would have only expected the Grand Canal to be deep and not the smaller ones. Besides seeing the canal here, we hit a wine bar / cicchetteria to hold us over until we found something more substantial to eat. This place was 100 yards on the same side of the canal as Accademia. He we snacked at the bar with 20 others on cheese, sausage and other food on thin crusty pieces of bread. For those that more than the various toothpick foods as it is called, there was a lady behind the bar was sawing bread and hunks of meat for sandwiches for workers on the go in the area. From here we moved on looking for the gondola shop. What we found with in another 100 yards down was the canal closed off and the shop closed. We were a little disappointed but ironically we saw on the flight back home the movie “An Italian Job”. What does gondolas, my writing and a cute movie have in common? If you have not seen the movie, the first 30 minutes are filmed in Venice. There is a chase scene in the movie with a few boats. In one scene you see the good guys zooming down a canal when 2 men are pushing a gondola into a canal. The bad guys smash into the gondola and in the background is the shop that we tried to see. Anyway, failing to see the work shop we headed southwest one block to where we saw a large channel and a big island called La Giudecca. What we viewed from the distance on La Giudecce was newer tall apartment buildings and the new construction of a large Hilton being built. Further down the walk way we stopped at Trattoria Borghi (0415210028) for a lunch of ravioli Bolognese, gnocchi's pomodora and a bottle of Chianti Riffino on Fond.Zattere Dei Gesuati near the marine docks. Lunch was good but we really liked “Robert’s” breadsticks being served in the plastic narrow bags you sometimes see at Italian delis in the States.. In fact we liked them so much that we bought a bag at the grocery store for less than $2E 20 yards back up the street.
Our next destination is what the locals and some books call the second best
church to see in Venice . This was called Friar’s Church. To get here we
followed a map and weaved in and out of small walk ways crossing several bridges
along the way and looking up for a steeply near the church. It should be noted
that bathrooms are not easing to get to in areas like these unless you find
one of these stand up bars. For the price of two glasses of red (less than $4E)
you get to use the facilities. Not too bad. If one has to buy something to use
the WC or toilet as it is called here one can think of worse things to buy. We
found Friar’s and was impressed with it. The famous artist Titian is interned
here and there is a other famous works of art by Bellini, Donnatello and
Titian. Friar’s is only 110 yards long. I would allow about 30 minutes unless
you like to stop and linger at each section of the church.
From here we meandered our way to the Rialto Bridge and around. We missed a main turn off while exploring the area but found the Valpolicella desert wine we were looking for at $30E for 500ml size. We also bought another couple of glasses of wine and used the facilities at another wine bar. (Perhaps this is a no lose business the Venetians have if you know what I mean. You buy wine, use the WC and then have to go again because you drank more wine forcing you to buy more wine to go again??)
At the Rialto Bridge the sun was setting and the weather turned pleasant so we did the obligatory gondola ride. I was not a fan of doing this and think it is a little tacky and expensive. After parting with $100E on the semi deluxe tour, James our gondolier did his 3 km rowing pointing out some historical buildings. He was not from the singers but we did see other boats with accordion players and singers which cost more. Some of the boats had the maximum 6 people because it was part of a large tour.
After our ride we headed back to drop off our trinkets and go back out to
dinner. Dinner is a small problem for Maureen. She does not like fish and is
allergic to certain types of seafood. This is not fun sometimes when most of the
good places serve mostly seafood and fish primarily and then throw a few meat
dishes in for good measure. After checking out a few places we opted to hit one
of the very touristy places on the west side of the Rialto Bridge. Here they
enclosed “outdoor” dinning in those plastic see through type shelters with
propane heated umbrellas. We sat down at the first place and when there was no
service got up and went to the third place. There was a cheery waiter who
seated us down. Our waitress came right away and we ordered as a starter a U.S.
version pepperoni pizza. Keep In mind that a pepperoni pizza here is a pizza
with peppers. If you want what Americans consider pepperoni pizza you ask for
the spicy salami pizza. We also got an order of fresh mozzarella and tomato.
Maureen had lasagna with a béchamel tomato sauce (something we want to try at
home) and I had 5 small grilled prawns. We also got our second bottle of red for
the day. After dinner we strolled back and packed.
Day 6: Heading home: We wanted to save a few Euros and take the water bus to the airport at a cost of $10E. The problem was hauling (in N.Y.many of us use the term schlepping) our luggage. The porter would cost the same price to take our luggage to the stop as it would the ride for the two of us. We devised a plan to go slowly but when it rained in the morning we cancelled this idea and ordered a taxi with a request that anyone wanting a taxi to the airport is welcomed to share it. Here we got lucky with a Macedonian businessman who was only too happy to share the $90E fare. The ride started out interesting as the tide was coming in. We had to go under some of the low bridges at a snails pace. At one bridge my fellow taxi rider and I along with the driver had to push down up on the bridge above us so the top of the windshield would not get stuck I think 5 more minutes and we would have been in serious trouble..
When you get to the airport dock, please note that you have take a free shuttle
bus to the terminal. . Men offer to help with your bags but beware they are not
taking you the 75 yards to the bus but taking your luggage in a truck to the
terminal counter. For some reason I asked how much and was told $10E so we took
it off the cart and walked to the bus on our own.
The flight back was uneventful. Business Elite or what you would call the old first class was nice. The seats recline to an almost level position. It is too bad the only time I had risotto was on board the plane. The hot fudge sundae and Italian desert wine was a nice touch.
Last minute notes…
Things I would like to see when I go back include…
1-Taking the elevator to the top of the Campanile in St Marks Square
2- See the Peggy Guggenheim Musuem
3- Head over to San Giorgio Maggiore and go up the tower for the view of Venice
4- See the area where the Customs House is
5- Wander around the Santa Croce area just to see what is there
6- I originally planned on taking a day trip to Verona so this will have to wait also.
7- Find a place that is known for its risotto.
Anyway, if you are heading to Venice, my advise is relax and take your time. Enjoy the sights, the food and the wine.
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