Thursday, June 8, 2017

Venice: floating fantasy

It's like a personality quiz question. What do you do when you only have 6 hours in Venice? Apparently the answer was 'ride the water bus and take pictures until your camera runs out of space'.


It would have been two more hours, but the 9am train from Florence was full. So knowing we only had a few hours, we decided to hit the two central sites - the Basilica of San Marco and the Rialto Bridge - and visit the island cemetery, a strange little place we hadn't seen the first time we were in this gorgeous city.


The reality of Venice permanently lives alongside the fantasy of Venice. We have read many books, watched many films, and even found comics about it.


The reality is a little more populated.


Venice earns its reputation as one of the world's most beautiful and storied cities. Even just cruising down the canals in the crowded water bus was visually inspiring.





Venice, in its heyday one of the busiest gateways into Asia, shows its eclectic heritage. We coasted past stately Roman facades sporting Byzantine and Islamic arches, passed bridges of ancient stone and futuristic glass and steel.




But we were there to sightsee, and our first stop was an unusually silent space in the crowded islands known on the water bus stops as Cimitero.


Check in next week to hear about the cemetery of San Michele!

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