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We walked over to St. Mark's Square. We walked through the Basilica itself.
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What's with the Lion? Did St. Mark keep one as a pet? St. Mark is buried here, his bones having been spirited out of the Moslem world by Venetian noblemen, who packed them in a barrel of pork rinds, an abomination to Muslims (see them holding their noses).
Oi!
Feh! Glatt treif!!
It's huge, dark, cavernous, and in need of a shining. We sat in on a small mass in Italian. We toured the ground floor of the Doge's palace., next door, and Carol continued on the second floor, filled with Baroque specialists, while I read outside in a café. I got ripped off here. I was charged 8€ for an espresso and a glass of water. Warning: do not buy anything or eat in the Piazza San Marco.
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We walked out to the Riva--the boardwalk along the Giudecca Canal. You could hear and see the Venetians of old rushing to the river to welcome home the victorious Otello:
Una vela, una vela
Un vesilo, un vesilo
Fende lettr'un torvo chieco
Spirito divertigini
Iddio scuto sol bieco
Come un teatro vel
Tutto fumo, tutto fuoco,
L'orrida vertigine...
Vittoria! Vittoria!!
And Otello disembarks:
Esultate!!We got aboard a vaporetto and went out to Murano, an island that specializes in hideous, ornate overpriced glass pieces--your grandmother probably had a few, and when you found them, you threw them out. Too bad. They're worth something. To whom...I don't know. It's a pretty town, though.
There are many fornacos where you can watch a horse get blown. Or, you can see the same thing at most farms in Vermont.
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Families do this from generation to generation. Most of it is very flowery and ornate, with multicolored glass. You might find one of these huge chandeliers, which cost $50,000 in the dining room of an Italian in waste management from Western Cranston. Other pieces are modern, rather like Mondrian, with square bright colors.
A word about the transportation system. The vaporetti are large barges with seats like a bus and a standing area in the middle.
The Grand Canal winds through the city and islands, and you take a vaporetto to just a couple of blocks from anywhere. You buy a pass for a week and keep the ticket in your pocket, but no one ever asked to see it. There are also private water taxis--long, sleek touring boats that you hire by the trip to take you anywhere you want. Most places have their own landings. We recommend water-taxi from your hotel to and from the airport--it costs $80, but it's worth it. Otherwise, a week's vaporetto pass will do fine. Taking a vaporetto ride is like taking a sightseeing boat through a picture postcard, wherever you go...certainly an an improvement over a bus. Otherwise, you walk, get lost easily, and find your bearings again easily, getting a picture postcard view every time you turn a corner or cross a tiny bridge.
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Back at the hotel, we rested a bit, and then set out to the opera. La Fenice,Venice's legendary opera house is under renovation, after a disastrous fire a few years ago, so we went just around the corner to a church where a concert of Baroque opera arias was given by singers and musicians in the garb of the period. We stopped on the way for a bite to eat. We decided to eat where the locals eat..a desk clerk from our hotel, the police on the local beat. Rule number two: don't eat where the locals eat. Back at the opera, the ensemble, with the exception of the baritone, was pretty good. It was like the minor leagues--the singers were either just kids, or else past their prime.
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