Around Every Corner and Canal - Venice

I've had many people comment that Venice is on their wish list; their bucket list; and being an expert on the city after 48 hours I can say that Venice definitely is not what people say or wish for....it is more; much more.

The first two photos on today's blog illustrate my point.

Top Photo:  notice the small things like the brass door handle on some random door in some random backstreet.

Second Photo: notice the grander than grand moments like the sun rising on the Grand Canal with the Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute beside it.

I stood on the stairs of the big bridge Ponte dell'Accademia.....competing with about 10 photographers who had huge cameras and tripods all set to capture the sun coming over the canal and Basilica (and a cruise ship that cruised into the picture).

I had a backpack and an IPhone ........and you get what you see above.

I keep seeing much of Venice through the lens of a pastor who has a calling to a church and that church continually (and wonderfully) works tirelessly just to keep basic maintenance on the parking lot, brick mortar and steeple. I know the simple costs for those things and I know they take careful planning and communicating with the members and they take money.

So I walk through the streets and over the simple bridges across back-canals and I notice the state of disrepair of buildings and am ever-fascinated by the water lapping up against the great buildings on the Grand Canal and the water swirling around hotels and simple houses. 

Along with great basilicas I wonder about the basements of those houses and what it would cost to.....to do who knows what, to keep them for another century or another decade!

It's beautiful, fascinating and yet my pastor's mind can't help calculate the cost in dollars and Euros.

Indeed, I see the romance, but I also see the finance.

Venice has existed for a millennia without me, I suppose it will last a few more days for my visit.

How come every old movie had a fictional town and that town had a movie theatre where the kids hung out...and it was named the Rialto. Finally, I have come to the Rialto (above), the most famous of the bridges in Venice. Walk up it, stand on the steps and watch pedestrians and canal traffic. Send your boyfriend to the bottom of the steps to get your photo of you leaning over the Rialto. Jostle your way to the rail and just stand for a half hour...that alone is worth the price of coming to Venice.

Across the top of the bridge is an ode to commerce with high-end jewelry and haute couture shops....kinda like the entire bridge was owned by Les Wexner.

The photo above is what I spent a half hour watching: the lifeblood of the city. Have you considered how the beer, the beef, the wine, the Coca Cola and the fashion are delivered to the stores. Trucks cannot go anywhere. It's all canals and barges and dollys and young men with biceps and it's an intricate system. Look at the above picture carefully; barges bring in the stuff, tie up at a dock the dollys are unloaded, and they are loaded with food and drink and whatever and the guys scurry through streets and alleys as narrow as two people abreast.

I watched the trash men for 15 minutes yesterday (I DID give equal time to looking at St. Mark's Square also). I am as fascinated by HOW the city is run as by the city itself.

The other day I tried to get from point A to point B. I was just trying to find some out of the way church that I had read about. Alas, I simply could not manage it. My cell phone GPS is pretty good, but at times, the labyrinth of streets confuses the satellite and you find that says that you are in the middle of the Grand Canal.

Then yesterday, just by chance, I found myself near the spot I was looking for the other day.

There is no way to waste time, for every minute of walking Venice is an education in grandeur itself.

         

Here is a tip for you. Do not walk and gawk. Two reasons; too many people and too many steps. And a third reason, you are liable to slip into a canal. When you look around, do not be near a canal or steps over a bridge. It just cannot be done. Pay attention or you will miss something glorious or something dangerous.

I have wandered into my share of basilicas and gallery's but even more wondrous are the details of the buildings and the out-of-the-way places in the city. Why is this (above) Madonna and Child on this small alcove fronting on the canal which few would ever see?

How many have noticed the canal sparkling on the underside of such bridges during the noon day sun? (Below)

       

        

The best surprise is to round a busy corner of the street or canal and find a church basking in the afternoon sun. They are a quiet respite from the crowds and the heat. Just go and sit in one. Just sit. It would take two days just to study the interior of the smallest church in Venice. Like my office which is loaded with books and mementos gathered from my lifetime; consider a church in the same way. Over the centuries more and more gifts and momentous and relics and shrines accumulate in the sanctuary of those churches. Just sit and take it all in.

Then walk out into the daylight and find the nearest Gelato stand, it shouldn't be difficult to do.

Above you see brick and stone and a simple window....all of which I would contend are art in itself. But, I was in a huge basilica the other day. It had Gothic elements, the only one in Venice but it was made of brick. The reason is simple (I guess) Venice is basically marsh land. Brick is lighter than great stone columns and thus Venice Churches are brick. 

(An irony of history considering DCC is built on the most solid of solid rock and yet it is made of lighter bricks. I suppose our ancestors back in 1877 were not going for the neo-Gothic style.)

Neither I nor any tourist in Venice tires of watching the gondolas and gondoliers glide past. The 175th gondola one passes in a day can still make the most jaded tourist stop and watch and take a  photo.

Last evening I watched a couple in a gondola pass beneath the bridge I was on; both of the people were looking at their cell phone AND the gondolier was paddling with one hand and looking at his cell phone in the other. (The laws of texting and gondoliering at the same time, have not kept up.)

And the cost to take a gondola?

It is $90 for a 30 minute ride during the day.

It is $120 for a 30 minute ride during the night time.

There seem to be no shortage of riders. I suppose it is everyone's dream to ride the canals of Venice just once in their lifetime. $100 is a fairly affordable dream.

(No, I never rode in one.)

London and Paris never cease to amaze and indeed Rome is eternal. But somewhere in the collective consciousness of the people is this idea of a city built on the water that will last and last and surprise us with each turn of a corner.

Such is Venice.

Peace,  Bob