August 20, 2013 - Last Day in Venice

Buongiorno All,

We were up and out fairly early as we decided to have breakfast at good old McDonalds, no more 35 Euros per head for breakfast.  Egg McMuffins and OJ with tea and coffee a damn site cheaper than the hotel.  There was a light mist of rain falling as we headed back to the hotel to pick up camera's and brush our teeth.  Today we are exploring the Cannaregio district, the area were our  hotel is located.  It is also the birth place of Marco Polo 1254 who left Venice as a merchant at the age of 18.  It is now raining pretty steady so we stopped at a store and purchased two rain ponchos.  They were 5 Euros each but the lady gave us 2 for the price of one.  Our first stop is what is known as the Ghetto.  In 1516 a decree was established that all the Jews of Venice would be confined on an island called Geto.  The area was isolated by canals and access points were controlled by Christian guards.  The Jews were only allowed to leave during the day and had to wear clothes that identified them.  It was in this area that all the Jews in Venice were imprisoned during WWII.  The picture above is where they were held before being loaded on boats and taken to the train station then loaded on cars for transport to concentration camps.  There are plaques on the wall commemorating the bleak conditions and treatment of the Jew.  It is still a rather bleak area compared to other areas we have explored.

We continued exploring and walked along the canal  pictured on the left.  We have walked along many such canals and were very pleased to see how clean the canals were and not smelly even with the summer heat . Our walk took us over a number of canals and we came to Chiesa di Sant'Alvise. A church that has the most beautiful painting on the ceiling and ornate altars. Pictures are not allowed inside but Fred stood at the door and got some shots of the interior.  The picture on the right is of the church's ceiling.

Our walk took us in a circular route that brought us to the church Madonna dell'Orto that is named after a statue of the Virgin with Child found in a nearby orto (vegetable garden).  Sadly the church was not open.  Next we headed along the Fondamenta Gasparo Contarini, Callle Vecchia and Fondamenta dell'Abbazia where we arrived at the church of Santa Maria della Misericordia.  By now it had stopped raining, so off came the ponchos.  It was a nice cool day (around 26ºC), a much better day for walking.  The church was undergoing major refurbishment so we were unable to the see inside of it.  We continued walking and found a little sandwich bar near the Campo Santa Maria Nuova to have lunch.  For 10 Euros we each had a sandwich and a glass of red wine.  The owner was very friendly and a lot of locals come in just for a coffee topped off with grappa served in small espresso type cups.  I ordered another sandwich and two more glasses of wine and the owner said not to pay until we are ready to go, to relax and enjoy which was exactly what we did.  The name of the place was Milan Bar; a great little place for lunch and seeing how the locals enjoy life.

After a relaxing lunch we continued our walk.  The picture on the right is of Santa Maria dei Miracoli.  A beautiful church sheathed in gleaming white marble.  The inside is very ornate and painted with a lot of gold. They have curtains at the entrance so you cannot see into the church properly just a mere glimpse.  We did not pay the fee to enter as no picture taking was allowed.  It took us quite some time to get a picture of the front of the church as there were two tourists that stood in front of it reading a guide book and trying to figure out where to go.  Very annoying, they could have stood of to one side to do this. We saw them again later in the day, still with that lost look on their faces.

We decided to head toward to Piazza San Marco as Fred wanted to  sit in the square and enjoy a drink while listening to an orchestra. When we were here 5 years ago they had lovely classical music being played. We wandered down taking in the sites as we walked. The picture on the left is of a home on a canal that was being reinforced by timbers and bricks at the base to stop it from sinking. We have seen a few places along the canals that we have traveled that are leaning as they continue to settle.

In Piazza San Marco we found only one restaurant open that has an orchestra playing, The Florian.
We ordered a red wine for me, a Venetian Beer for Fred and a Black Cherry Sunday to share. The order was elegantly presented on a silver tray with a jug of water, puff pastry sticks, olives (it is pictured on the left).  We sat for about a good hour enjoying the music, our drinks and added treats.  The waiter took our picture once all the goodies were gone.  A tick off the bucket list.  We then headed back to the hotel to pack and relax before heading out to have our last meal in Venice.

For supper tonight, we picked a restaurant that was fairly close to the hotel.  On the outside it didn't look anything special but inside it was very pretty and rather large.  We knew we were onto a decent restaurant when the locals were getting multiple boxes of take away pizza.  For appetizers Fred had a shrimp cocktail of Venetian shrimp on soft polenta which was recommended by our waiter and I had prosciutto and melon.  My appetizer alone could have been a main meal it was that large; but it was very refreshing.  We both had pizza as our main course, mine was a K.O. which was pepperoni, peppers, tomato and mozzarella. Fred had Diavola which was a spicy salami.  The pizzas were cooked in a wood fired oven.  Dessert was cappuccino and limoncello for each of us.  A great meal to end our holiday celebration of 40 years of marriage.

Sadly we had to leave bright and early the next day for the UK.  We have had a fantastic time and explored some out of the way places in Venice.  We did not cover everything so there is still more to see if we decide to return at a future date.

Ciao we hope you have enjoyed this segment of our travels.

Sandy & Fred

August 19, 2013 - Exploring The Nooks & Crannies of Venice

Buongiorno All,

Our first full day in Venice started at a reasonable hour.  We headed down for breakfast which was buffet style plus a hot dish.  We had a bit of an eye opener once we were seated as breakfast was 35 Euros a person as we did not prebook or have it included in our stay.  We did enjoy our hot portion, Fred had a full English breakfast and I had a cheese omelet.  We also had  a couple of yummy chocolate croissants.  We had planned where we wanted to explore last evening and decided to take the hotel's shuttle to San Marco Square.  Walking would have been quicker but considering the amount of walking we had planned to do together with the predicted temperature of 30ºC, a boat ride was in order.

Once we landed at San Marco we did a quick walk around the square to take a few pictures.  It was already extremely crowded but we were heading off to explore some of the out of the way areas of San Marco and Castello districts as we had seen the major attractions five years ago.  The picture at the top is of the Bridge of Sighs; prisoners were walked across it to their execution.  Last time we were in Venice it was covered over as it was being repaired.  We continued our walk along the Grand Canal turning onto Calle San Zaccaria a very narrow street which led into Campo San Zaccaria

Our first stop was the church of San Zaccaria a Renaissance/Gothic church dedicated to the father of John the Baptist.  The inside of the church looked like a picture gallery with works by Tiepolo, Tintoretto, Van Dyck and Bellini as well as other masters.  The picture on the right is of the interior of the church.  We continued walking and did get turned around a few times.  Fred then came up with the idea of counting canals to be crossed rather than looking for street names as the guides and maps do not list all the names.

Our walk continued winding around, along and over many small canals.  We came upon the next church Santa Maria Formosa a 15th century church.  This church however was closed to the public.

The picture on the left is a sample of the views we saw as we walked through the Castello district of Venice.  It was very hot again and we ended up taking our time taking pictures and enjoying the sites.  We finally came  to Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo.  There is a statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni a 15th century mercenary who had requested a statue in his honour be erected in front of San Marco.  The doges honoured his wish with an impressive equestrian monument in front of Scuola Grande di San Marco, which was not the San Marco he had in mind.  This brings us to the Basilica Dei Santi Giovanni e Paolo one of the largest churches in Venice. We paid the 2.50 euro fee to enter the church as we were also allowed to take pictures inside of the church.  It was a magnificent church and it holds the remains of numerous doges (a doge was a chief magistrate who held the position for life).  More pictures of the inside of the church can been seen on my Facebook page or  on our Flickr site once we have them posted.

We then meandered our way to Fondamenta Nuova for a nice walk beside the lagoon, which provided a nice breeze off it.  We had a late lunch at Algiubagio  Restaurant where we enjoyed a most wonderful and relaxing lunch looking out over the lagoon to Murano and San Michele.

A bottle of Valpolicella, appetizers were scallops for Fred and shrimps as pictured on the right for me.  I really should have known better than to order shrimp as they came with their heads on. I really had no idea how to eat them and our waiter could see I had no idea.  He gave me a quick lesson on how to get the meat out.  Fred had a good chuckle as he knows I hate those little eyes staring at me.  The appetizer was delicious and easy to eat once you know how to get at the meat of the shrimp.  Our main courses were a green tagliatelle with lobster for me and seafood ravioli with shrimp for Fred.

After lunch we meandered our way back to the hotel taking photo's along the way.  We stopped at a grocery store to get a bottle of wine for later that night.  We got much needed showers and actually had a nap as the heat was exhausting.

Refreshed we headed out for a late supper.  We meandered our way down to the Rialto Bridge and had supper on the Grand Canal.  Sadly dinner was disappointing, we were in a dark area and the bread was stale. Fred had a caprese salad that was mediocre at best and we both had grilled shrimp. We had to ask for hand towels and the service was rather poor.  To top things off the waiter asked Fred for a tip even though 12% was added to the bill as a service charge.  He had the audacity to say that that was a tax.  Fred politely told him I don't think so, me I would have been much more rude about it had I realized what he was talking about.  Well I guess wherever you go there is always someone that will try that.

We stopped to take pictures of the Rialto Bridge at night, then strolled back to the hotel stopping for gelato on the way and enjoying a glass of wine before we retiring for the night.

Ciao,

Sandy & Fred

August 18, 2013 - Celebrating 40 Years of Wedded Bliss in Venice

Buongiorno All,

We were up and out early to catch our 2 1/2 hour flight from Manchester to Venice.  The flight was full but fairly quiet even with the kids on board.  The flight was very smooth though there was a lot of cloud cover, the picture on the right is of the snow covered  Italian Alps.  Once we had landed we got through customs with no fuss at all even with my Canadian Passport.  We just showed the picture page and were waved on, no stamp or asking how long we were staying.  As we had our luggage with us (we only took carry on) we were out of the airport quickly.  After purchasing our water bus tickets to Venice, we made the short walk to the pier and to our pleasure it was only a short wait before we were on our way, disembarking at Madonna dell'Orto.

The picture on the left was taken from the water bus.  While on route to our hotel we had a bit of excitement.  There is a speed limit but a private water taxi ignored it completely, sped by causing big waves.  Needless to say our bus hit one and we got wet as the water splashed through an open window.  Fred and I only got a little wet, however, the couple across from us got totally soaked.  The driver shouted at the water taxi and apologized as he doesn't carry towels for such occasions.  It was a very hot day so getting dry wasn't an issue.  From our stop it was a short walk to The Boscolo Venezia, our home away from home for the next 3 nights.  Once we had checked in and made reservations for our dinner, it was a quick change and then we headed out to explore.  We crossed over three bridges which brought us to the Strada Nova a major shopping street that winds around and across numerous canals all the way down to the Rialto.  We wandered along checking out the various shops and stopping for photo opportunities.  The picture on the right was taken from the Rialto bridge is of a canal off the Grand Canal.

We stopped for lunch in one of the many restaurants that line the Strada Nova.  Fred ordered a birra grande and it was huge.  I don't know how he could even lift it to drink it.  I had a diet coke as it was very hot in the high 80's and I needed a cold drink.  We ordered pizza's mine was funghi and Fred's was diavola.  I then had a nice glass of red wine, had you worried didn't I.  Once lunch was finished we meandered back to the hotel to rest, cool off and clean up before supper.  We are so not used to these hot temperatures that we were exhausted.

Back at the hotel we discovered in our room a bottle of Prosecco and a card wishing us A Happy Anniversary.  Once showered and after a quick nap we enjoyed a pre-dinner drink of Prosecco before heading down to dinner.  Once we were seated we had a good laugh as we were the only couple in the garden restaurant.  When we were checking in, it was recommended that we book a reservation as the hotel was very busy.  Eventually, another couple did arrive but we still basically had the place to ourselves.  We were treated to an amuse-bouche of toast with a smoked salmon cream while we waited for our appetizers.  Our appetizers were Caprese Salads with prosciutto which were dressed with oil and pepper at the table.  Our wine was an Amarone which was presented in a special manner. At the table the bottle was opened and decanted, well swished to aerate and Fred was given a separate glass to taste it.  On his approval the wine was then served in lovely crystal balloon glasses. My main course was rigatoni with tomatoes and a tomato cream sauce and Fred had sea bass with vegetables.  We ended our dinner with chocolate molten cake with fresh fruit. We asked our waiter if he would be so kind and take a picture of us which he graciously did.
The picture on the left is of us 40 years ago on our wedding day.  The one on the right is of us today.  It was still very warm out, so after dinner we headed out for a short walk along the canal before heading back to our room.  Once back we finished our celebration with the balance of our bottle of Prosecco.

It was a wonderful anniversary day in a beautiful city.

Ciao,

Sandy & Fred