Day 25 – Venice, Italy
Up early today for a 7:30 breakfast and then an 8:30 walking tour of Venice. Our guide is a local woman and she likes to do the tours early in the morning before all the tourists swarm the square. Yesterday, the square was packed with people and pigeons. They both clear out in the evening and don’t return until later the next morning.
Our guide told us all about the buildings we saw in the square and their significance in history and then we headed through the back streets of Venice where the people really live. There was a lot of laundry hanging from the windows, fruit stalls in the streets and we actually went to a park. This is special because there are not trees or grass in Venice. The entire city is built on millions of pilings driven into the lagoon floor. Napoleon had the park we went to built but I’m not sure how the trees can grow there unless it is part of the natural island of Venice.
After the tour was over we were encouraged to just wander around Venice and basically get ourselves lost so that we could see the real city. We did go back to the square to see the Basicilica when they turned on the lights. The interior of the church is extremely dark and they only turn on the lights for one hour during the day. The entire ceiling of the church is covered in mosaics that all have a glittery gold background. It is beautiful. You were not allowed to take pictures inside the church so we purchased a few postcards showing the interior.
After seeing the church Paul and I took off in search of lunch. We went back to a street we had gone down during our tour where there aren’t many tourists and bought some fruit from a stand, sandwiches and drinks from a little bar and walked to the park for a picnic. We then wandered the back streets of Venice going in any church we found and taking pictures. Once back in the square we got some gelato and then headed back to our room to rest before our 6:30pm meeting time for the cicchetti.
Up early today for a 7:30 breakfast and then an 8:30 walking tour of Venice. Our guide is a local woman and she likes to do the tours early in the morning before all the tourists swarm the square. Yesterday, the square was packed with people and pigeons. They both clear out in the evening and don’t return until later the next morning.
Our guide told us all about the buildings we saw in the square and their significance in history and then we headed through the back streets of Venice where the people really live. There was a lot of laundry hanging from the windows, fruit stalls in the streets and we actually went to a park. This is special because there are not trees or grass in Venice. The entire city is built on millions of pilings driven into the lagoon floor. Napoleon had the park we went to built but I’m not sure how the trees can grow there unless it is part of the natural island of Venice.
After the tour was over we were encouraged to just wander around Venice and basically get ourselves lost so that we could see the real city. We did go back to the square to see the Basicilica when they turned on the lights. The interior of the church is extremely dark and they only turn on the lights for one hour during the day. The entire ceiling of the church is covered in mosaics that all have a glittery gold background. It is beautiful. You were not allowed to take pictures inside the church so we purchased a few postcards showing the interior.After seeing the church Paul and I took off in search of lunch. We went back to a street we had gone down during our tour where there aren’t many tourists and bought some fruit from a stand, sandwiches and drinks from a little bar and walked to the park for a picnic. We then wandered the back streets of Venice going in any church we found and taking pictures. Once back in the square we got some gelato and then headed back to our room to rest before our 6:30pm meeting time for the cicchetti.
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