Friday 23 May: Around the Republic of Venice

Gary and I had a good breakfast at our b&b and headed out to the Public Gardens at one end of Venice. The weather in the morning was clear and warm with a nice light breeze, and we walked through the groves and flower beds of the park. In the center is Caffè Paradiso, a beautiful caffè with excellent outdoor lounge furniture, an interior art gallery, fantastic coffee, and outstanding service. We enjoyed a couple of coffees there and then walked toward the heart of Venice, the Piazza San Marco. The sun was bright, so I bought a dashing gondolier’s hat, a straw boater featuring a bright blue ribbon with VENEZIA printed on it. Gary and I stopped at a pizzeria for lunch, where he had a good pizza with sausage, and I had pizza frutti di mare, complete with squid, mussels, and a whole baby octopus! Chomping the octopus whole made a good photo-op, which you can see on Flickr.

The common picture of Europe in the Middle Ages is a land of kings, knights, and castles. However, for centuries, the wealthiest and most powerful nation in Europe wasn’t a kingdom; it was the Republic of Venice. An independent trading empire for over a thousand years, the Republic was ruled by powerful noble families whose wealth was based on trade and shipping, and who elected a leader for life, called the Doge. Every year, with great pomp and ceremony, the Doge would cast a gold ring into the Adriatic to represent Venice’s marriage to the sea. The upper classes of Venice were famous throughout Europe and the Mediterranean world as leaders of fashion, benefactors of art and literature, and patrons of music. The Republic of Venice lasted until 1797, when it surrendered to Napoleon Bonaparte and the army of the French Republic (soon to be French Empire). Napoleon had plans of setting up a capitol in Venice, but never got around to it (he was sort of busy conquering the rest of Europe, fighting Britain and Russia, and eventually being deposed). The heart of the old Venetian Republic, as well as of modern Venice, is Piazza San Marco. Right on the lagoon, this huge paved piazza housed the Palace of the Doge, a gorgeous Gothic fantasy of inlaid brickwork, marble columns, and ornate windows. On the other side of the piazza is the gigantic Basilica of San Marco, home to the relics of Saint Mark the Evangelist. This huge, opulent church is in the Byzantine style, covered inside and out with mosaics, with altars, side chapels, and artwork in the Gothic, Renaissance, baroque, and later styles. The floor is wavy and uneven because it is so old, and it is supported by literally millions of pine tree trunks driven as piles through the water a thousand years ago into the clay at the bottom of the lagoon. The basilica is a dazzling confusion of artwork that you have to see to appreciate. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the plum musician’s job in all of Europe was that of music director at the Basilica San Marco, a post held by Gabriel Gabrieli and Claudio Monteverdi.

Gary and I had a guided tour of the key sights in Venice scheduled for the afternoon. It was now starting to drizzle a little, and since I had unfortunately left my dashing gondolier’s hat at the pizzeria, Gary bought me a fetching blue parasol printed with American blue jeans pockets, which I could use to keep off either rain or sunshine. Our tour took us around the Piazza and the Doge’s Palace, through the basilica, and to some of the key points in the city, including the elegant little marble church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli, the great church of San Giovanni e Paolo where many Doges are buried, and the house of Marco Polo, the thirteenth-century Venetian trader and explorer who crossed Asia to China and lived for years at the court of Kublai Khan. We also saw the great opera house La Fenice, “The Phoenix,” named that because it burnt down in the nineteenth century and was rebuilt on its original site. Unfortunately, it burnt down again in 1996, and only the façade remains. Concerts are held all over the city to raise funds for its restoration. Out tour ended at Rialto, home to the famous bridge as well as the main produce and seafood markets of the city.

After our walking tour we had a break for a couple of hours, so we got out of the rain for a caffè corretto at Gran Caffe Chioggia, one of the world’s most prestigious coffee houses right on Piazza San Marco. It had better be prestigious; coffee with a shot of brandy for two was almost thirty dollars! Luckily the rain was clearing up, the sun came out, and the clouds rolled away. The timing was perfect, because Gary and I had scheduled a late afternoon cruise around the Venetian lagoon and down the entire length of the Grand Canal. Out boat was an elegant private craft with enclosed cabin and small open decks on the front and back. Six of us, the captain, and the tour guide got aboard for a “three-hour cruise” minus Gilligan. The weather was perfect. The sun reflected off the water and cast light on the amazing churches, palaces, and other buildings on the water’s edge. Byzantine, Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance, baroque, and rococo buildings vied for our attention in a glittering array of prismatic marble, colored mosaics, and inlaid stone and brick work. Palaces and basilicas fronted the canal, their main steps leading directly to the water. Gary and I took lots of pics; they’re on Flickr at www.flickr.com/danielcmack. As we cruised, we had glasses of Prosecco, the tasty sparkling wine of the Veneto. Words can’t describe the incredible and bizarre beauty of Venice as seen from the water: historic buildings, rich and exotic materials, flowers and gardens, all combined in a riot of color along the ever-present and ever-changing water.

After our cruise we had dinner on the edge of the lagoon. Gary had one of his favorites, spaghetti alla carbonara, and I had what I had been waiting for: risotto frutti di mare, rice with mixed shellfish. It was incredibly good, and we were amused by the antics of the diners at the next table. They were being attacked by small sparrows looking for crumbs. The woman obviously had a phobia about birds, and was flailing her arms and shrieking like Tippi Hendren in The Birds. Sparrows might be annoying, but I’ve never found them that terrifying myself. We ended the long day with gelato before bed.