McKinnon Euro Vacation 2013: Venice

Venice – Days 6 and 7

Day 6 – Venice

On Sunday morning, we boarded the high speed drain and bid “ciao” to Rome. Tommy and Jimmy – our train freaks – were really excited when they saw the train that we would be riding on. Tree was not.

Most everyone slept on the 4 hour ride from Rome to Venice, excepting of course Dad, who could feel the insatiable thirst of his audience and cranked out the final Rome blog.

I suspect that many of you have been to Venice, but for those of you who have not, let me attempt to take you there… Venice is set off about 2-3 miles from the mainland of Italy. It is a man-made town, built centuries ago in shallow marsh water to protect the Venetians from invading Huns. It is actually built on millions of wooden pilings, which apparently have calcified over time and make for a solid foundation.

Visually, Venice is stunning. Clusters of small, painted buildings with wooden shutters and terra cotta shingles dot approximately 5 different villages. Narrow 8 foot wide alleyways wind their way among the buildings in a maze-like manner – with no pattern or seeming logic - occasionally crossing a small canal. Gondolas - held by gondoliers in their blue striped shirts - park in the small canals, eagerly awaiting their next passenger. The grand canal – 25 to 50 yards wide at points -- cuts thru the middle of town, an ancient equivalent of “the strip,” water taxis substituting for hot rods, cruising (seemingly aimlessly) back and forth.

Now, to truly take you there, I need to also replicate the smell that hit us when we exited the train station onto the main dock. The best way I can describe it is dead fish meets dead rat. Mix them together, close your eyes and envision what I described above, and you are as good as there. (Fortunately, the human body gets used to the scent over time, because after a few hours it didn’t bother us any more.)

As most of you know, I am a very frugal person. To the extent possible, I had prepared myself for Venice, and the cost of eating and getting around. Apparently not enough, however. When we got to the dock, we had three choices for getting to our apartment. Walk by land, about 1 mile, thru the maze (which we did not yet know) and up and over about 6 bridges. Take the public water bus, which is packed full and slow. Or take a private water taxi. I lobbied hard to walk, pointing out that our bags have wheels, and that Billy and Danny are young and strong and can port them over the bridges. Tree preferred the water taxi, and the romantic and scenic view it offered us of the town. Of course, we took the taxi. Seven minutes later, and eighty euros poorer, we arrived at our dock. We only had time to take 3 photos – that’s how short the ride is. Clearly the regulatory agency in Venice is clever. The cheapest taxi rate is 80 euros. Ninety seven percent of all trips are between the train station and one of the 15 disembarking points along the Grand Canal.

Fortunately we arrived safely, found our apartment and unpacked. It was late afternoon, so we set out to explore Venice and grab some dinner.

Boarding the Water Taxi

View from the front of the water taxi in Grand Canal

Just arrived at our apartment in Venice

Outside of our apartment

Our first stop was the Rialto Bridge. Originally built in 1255 as a wooden structure, it has a storied history, including being burnt down in the 1300 and collapsing under the weight of a crowd in the 1400s. The current stone structure – at the time an architectural marvel – was completed in 1591. The bridge has two steep staircases that meet at a large portico-like area atop the bridge. The bridge is divided into three separate crossing paths that run its length and are lined with shops. As we took the obligatory photo atop the bridge, the crowds were so big I wondered if it would collapse again.

Our first stop - Rialto Bridge

We set off from the Rialto, and walked right into the Venetian equivalent of a speed trap. A nice looking, clean-cut young Italian man, speaking perfect English, asked us if we would be interested in a guided tour of Venice by gondola. “Only 60 euros for 20 or 30 minutes.” I did the math, and thats a 50% difference. I asked twice to clarify – is it 20 minutes, or 30 minutes? His response, both times – “yes, more or less.” More important, he informed me, now was the time to take the gondola ride, because in 30 minutes the rates would increase to 100 euros" (night-time rates)!

We hovered for a moment, then bit. I knew I wasn’t going to get out of Venice without a gondola ride – Tree and Patsy* had not been able to afford it when they last visited Venice during college – so I may as well take advantage of this gondolier’s perfect English and the reduced rates. As he took us to his boat, the bait and switch became evident. We went around the corner and were suddenly passed off to a not so clean-cut and not so English-speaking man, who would serve as our guide. We were only 10 feet from the dock (dead fish floating all around us) when the up-sell began. “You want short tour, or long tour? Short tour, 60 euros. Long tour, 80 euros. Long tour include Grand Canal.”

(* Over the course of our 15 years of marriage I have heard many stories about Tree's and Patsy's 1 month, 7 country, $1000/budget European vacation. It was always "Patsy and I did this..." or "Patsy and I did that..." It was not until today that I learned that there were two more people on the trip - Meg and Danielle. Forever lost in history, apparently. (Until now.))

Knowing that we would only be here once, I sucked it up and did the long tour. It was 30 minutes on the nose, but did take us past some interesting landmarks, including Marco Polo’s home, Cassanova’s home, Venice’s original prison and under the Rialto Bridge. We had gotten our photo op and I knew my readers would be happy.

Setting out on the gondola ride

Jimmy's Oedipus complex-- intervening on even the most romantic of moments

Approaching the Rialto Bridge

Marco Polo's House

Lilly wanted her moment in the "King Chair"

Venice's original prison (in background)

Dad was eventually bumped from the "king chair"

Arriving back at the dock

Astute readers will recall Jimmy's story about the crab races in St. Peter's cathedral (from our Rome blog). Well, lo and behold, as we exited the gondola, Jimmy saw St. Peter (his crab) in the water. Finally they were reunited.

Jim with St. Peter

After the gondola ride, it was still too early for dinner, so we decided to hit St. Mark’s square. Aside from being a beautiful piazza encircled by an architecturally stunning building, St. Marks is famous for its pigeons. Until 5 years ago, you were allowed to feed them, but apparently the pigeons became too comfortable with the tourists and would land on them to beg for food. Now there are women in yellow shirts who patrol the square in a futile attempt to stop the tourists’ constant feeding. I don’t think Venice truly cares to stop the pigeon feeding, because if they did, they would simply arrest the Bangladeshi men who walk up to you and quickly put the bird feed in your hands, saying “one euro.” Of course, the men -- who are sadly (apparently) under the control of organized crime rings and are not there by choice -- won't take the seed back, so you are stuck either not paying them and witnessing their wrath (we saw one man get hounded/followed for 10 minutes because he had not paid for the seed he did not want), or shelling our a euro for 1/2 cent worth of seed. The kids gladly extended their hands to these men, and we ended up buying about 4 euros worth of seed. Fortunately, it yielded the following photos:

Tommy was the only one truly comfortable with the pigeons

Maybe a bit too comfortable. We made sure he showered before bed.

Rest of family in St. Marks

We have dubbed Tommy bird boy.

At 7pm the restaurants opened, and we set off for dinner. Venice was crowded, and the first two restaurants we went to were full. We finally found a wonderful hole in the wall called Bella a la Madonna and had a great meal. We walked back to the apartment and finally tucked in.

Day 7 – Venice

We only had two days in Venice, so today was our day to see the lesser known tourist spots. For all of its construed tourist-trappy attractions – the gondola rides, the water-taxis, Rialto Bridge, the pigeon feeding -- Venice actually has a rich history and some truly remarkable offerings. We slept in a bit, but were on the streets by 10:00.

Our first stop was the Accademie Bridge, the lesser cousin to the Rialto. The Accademie was built originally as a temporary structure for a fair in Venice, but the Venetians liked it so much that they decided to keep it. The bridge is all wood, and spans the Grand Canal. A recent tradition has been to place a lock on the bridge railing and to toss the key into the water, sealing your love forever. We made note of the tradition, but were on a mission and didn't have time to do the lock thing. We crossed the bridge and landed on the Accademie Museum, which houses the largest collection of Venetian art in the world.

Atop the Accademie Bridge

The Accademie Museum

The museum consists of 24 massive rooms housing the most significant Venetian art going back to the 1400s. We were only in room #2 when kids started to get bored, and dropped back, leaving me and Tree to admire the art alone. Not for long. Apparently Billy decided to challenge Jimmy -- "Jimmy, I bet you cant run around the perimeter of this room in less than 1 minute." Of course, Jim took the bet. When Tree and I got back, a marmish woman was standing with the kids. She cursed me out in Italian, but I was pretty clear on what she was saying -- mind your kids. Good luck.

School Marm -- scolded Jimmy for running

We grabbed lunch and then hit our next stop -- Santa Maria Glorioso dei Frari church, which houses Titian’s Assunta. Fodors calls Assunta the “most beautiful alter piece in the world.” The church – which was completed in 1442 – took more than 100 years to build. Indeed, it is cavernous and goes on and on. I took an art history class in college, and I can confirm -- they did some sweet painting back then.

Madonna and Child Tryptich

Display of candle holders and tabernacles (where hosts are kept during mass)

Another Madonna and Child Tryptich

Titian's Assunta alterpiece

A close up of Assunta -- 20 foot tall painting

Jimmy lighting a candle in memory of Uncle John, who passed away this week at age 92

The church was truly amazing. Before we left, we passed a shrine to Mother Mary. The shrine was filled to overflowing with photos, notes and prayers for the sick. Tree added a note from our family, praying for all of the deceased and sick among the extended McKinnon/McLister clan. Jimmy lit a number of candles. It was very touching.

We continued to stroll thru Venice when we hit our first snag of the vacation. Suddenly, we could not find Billy. He had been trail-blazing all along, walking a full 50 to 100 yards ahead of us. Apparently, when we ducked into a grocery to replenish our water supply, he did not see us and kept going.

For the next 60-90 minutes, we patrolled the streets looking for him. We went to the obvious places – Rialto Bridge, St. Marks Square – but no Billy. Since Tree and I were dragging 4 kids, we were moving slowly. Ultimately I shed them to start looking for Billy and found him -- at the Gucci store. For some crazy reason Billy had become fixated on buying a pair of suspenders and knew we were eventually going to visit that store...

From Billy's vantage, he claims he turned around and we were gone. He went to all major landmarks to look for us, but came up empty. Just in case, he went to the house and left us this note.

Our scare averted, we regrouped and got dinner. We finished by walking back to the Accademie Bridge and putting our own lock on it. Together forever, or at least until the next time that we lose a kid.**