Saturday, November 28, 2009

Ahhhhh~ Venezia!

We set foot on Venice running.
I had booked a rather comfy hotel in Mestre; on the other side of the lagoon. They took very good care of us by getting us 36 hour passes for the bus and pointing us to the bus stop around the corner from the hotel that would take us to the Venice bus station, Piazzle Roma. Also getting vaparetto tickets, so that we didn't have to do that when we arrived in Venice. Vaparettos are water buses that you take to get from place to place around Venice. From there we boarded a vaparato, to the neighboring islands of Murano,(famous for mouth blown glass), and Burano,(famous for their lace and tapestries).

We saw the sights and were witnessed to a family squabble with a lot of Italian yelling and pushing in a glass show room that cleared the place as soon as the yelling stopped! Talk about a bull in a china shop!

On to Burano for wandering off the beaten path to take in all the magnificent color! My quote here was,"If you were a house here, what color would you be?"
Lemon,lime,raspberry,wine,aquamarine blue,pea green,red,tangerine. it is all here, making it quite a wonder to see and very pleasing. There is also a bell tower that is leaning, causing you to wonder how much longer will it stay upright?
This is a place Steve and I would like to get a house to stay for about 6 months and enjoy life.
Will it happen? I don't know, but we like to dream.
It was so much fun to bring friends here and encourage them to explore and enjoy!

Back on the main island of Venice, we walked into the Piazza San Marco with it's unusually beautiful Basilica, I had never seen anything quite like it. It almost appears Moorish in architecture.It is suppose to house the relic of Saint Mark, the Apostle, brought there from Alexandria, Egypt. How he ended up in Alexandria is a puzzle to me, but they brought him back to Italy for safe keeping. It is awe inspiring to stand in that square and look at the Basilica itself with it's beautiful marble archeticture and mosiacs and the surrounding buildings , but try it with a full moon! WOW! La Bella Luna!

The next morning we returned to the Piazza and made our way through the inner streets and over canals to search for the perfect Gondolier. Ours was Nicolo Dolge Trevesano.

Off we floated,enchanted to cruse the canals of Venice with beautiful views of hard to see buildings. We floated past Marco Polo's home. I even recognised a platform that I have stood on photographing others gliding by in gondolas, and my favorite restaurant that is so picturesque!
I was so excited to be in familiar areas I had previously explored on foot!
A little shopping, a little exploring and then it was time to return home to the farmhouse.
Ahhh, I feel that we will return again some day!

6 comments:

Syazwi Aljabri said...

Oh, you had a lots of fun there! I wish I can go to Venice one day..

erika said...

I love the pictures. So beautiful. I heard of a really good, authentic Italian restaurant last night is Cardiff on the 101 (from Diane)... it is run by two Italian sisters. She said it was wonderful. You might have to check it out.

Pamela said...

Wow! I haven't blogged in a couple of days, and was thrilled to see that you posted all of these awesome pictures! Thank you for spending the time to document these travels. For those of us who have never been, it is a treat for the eyes!

Jennyff said...

I'm really enjoying all your photographs, so vibrant and cheery on a frosty Scottish morning. Thank you.

Vista Gal said...

I hope that one day we can all see it together as a family!
Wouldn't that be FUN!!!

Pamela said...

That would be awesome!