Venice ...and Vivaldi

Hello Friends and Family:
This morning, when I woke up, I remembered I was in Venice. I could hear the sound of seagulls squawking somewhere, but I could also hear something else. It was the sound of a motorboat passing down the canal just under our bedroom window. I stepped onto the balcony, and there was a man quietly maneuvering his boat through the canal - the water splashing gently up behind.
It took me a whole night - but now that I'm sufficiently recovered from the Ducati motorbike tour, I already know the day will be full of excitement! I felt like I was in Purgatory yesterday...walking around the motorcycle factory. Even walking across the parking lot was a dreary affair - with green, healthy weeds poking up through cracks everywhere. It's just awful when you feel you don't have a shred in common with an entire segment of society. What would happen if I got stuck on an island with these people? While on the tour of the factory, I did try to fit in though, by saying pleasant things, such as "Isn't that a nice color?", when actually, I was politely told that Ducati is famous for its red color. Red is the symbol of Italy for cars and motorcycles after all!
Now onto Venice...If you ever want to read a fascinating book about this city, I recommend "City of Falling Angels", by John Berendt. It tells the story of some interesting inhabitants of Venice, whom the author met while living there, and explains some interesting things about Venice and its people.
Venice is a city in northeastern Italy situated on a group of 118 small islands, separated by canals and linked by bridges. It's amazing to think you can build a city on a number of islands! It is so beautiful and has such unique scenery. It has the Carnival of Venice once a year, when everyone wears a mask, and the history of this carnival is fascinating. Other huge attractions are St Mark's Basilica, the Grand Canal, and the Piazza San Marco. Sadly, Venice now relies heavily on the cruise ship industry, so that gives you a picture of what it can be like here, especially in the daytime.
As we were on our way down for breakfast, I noticed our room door had a gold tag with a name engraved in it. The engraving read, "Il Cavaliere e la Dama", which means,"The Knight and the Lady" - (perfect for Ron and I). We discovered this hotel was a 16th century palace.
Breakfast really was a lovely affair in an exquisite little room, or if you preferred to take breakfast outside, there was a patio with small tables set up. Jasmine flowers grew in large masses up the brick walls. Each table was set with white, lacey table linens and china, and over on the counter was a buffet with the usual contintental breakfast. If you walked a few steps from the breakfast patio, you could step down a few stairs into the canal. On this side of the hotel, you could be brought right up to the door by water taxi.
After breakfast, we did our usual favourite thing and walked down a narrow little street to a caffe for cappuccino, Caffe Bar "AI Artisti" -(which we'd stopped at yesterday in the afternoon). This caffe opened in 1897 - and is not old for Venice. There we loosely planned our day. We walked over to the Campo San Fantin where the Teatro La Fenice Opera House is located. We did a tour with an audio guide, which explained its history. The Phoenix (Fenice), a symbol of this opera house. The Phoenix rises out of the ashes, because the opera house has been devastated by fires and has been rebuilt and restored on more than one occasion. I remembered the story of this opera house because of the book "City of Falling Angels."
We kept walking and soon came to a very narrow street called Calle Gritti O Del Campaniel. It was so narrow, you could touch both walls standing in the middle. Soon, we came out to the Grand Canal where we were able to view the Gallery of Peggy Guggenheim in the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni. This gallery was the former home of Peggy, and is an unfinished 18th century Grand Canal Palace. Because we were able to tour this Gallery and its works of art once before, we did not plan to return. However, after reading "Out Of This Century- The Story of Peggy Guggenheim", I had hoped to at least see it again, and take a picture.
We then strolled past the Chiesa di San Maurizio, which is now the Museo Della Musica and is primarily dedicated to housing an amazing collection of violins, clarinets, cellos, mandolins, lutes, some of which date back to the 1600's. This musical centre pays tribute to Antonio Vivaldi, who was born in Venice in 1678. We were able to purchase tickets to attend a Concerto Antonio Vivaldi this evening at 9:00 pm at the Chiesa of San Vidal. The entire time we toured this Centre, a rich, deep violin played in the background along with a beautiful voice of Cristinal Nadal InVolo singing opera.
Then, once again, we had a delightful break at a little dessert bar called La Bottega del Caffe for olives and the teensiest salami sandwich, (and no dessert) along with a refreshing spritzer. We noticed this brightly colored drink (red or orange), a few different times. When Ron asked our waiter, "What is that?" Our waiter feigned absolute shock and fell back into a chair. "What?" he said. Ron humbly waited for an explanation. So - we discovered that Campari is an aperitif liqueur made from the infusion of herbs and fruit in alcohol and water and usually mixed with sparkling wine and mineral water. Ron tried it and liked it's bitter, citrusy flavour. There are so many delightful, hidden caffes in the most unsuspecting of areas here. We keep reminding ourselves,"Oh, we must try that one!"
By this time of day, there were hordes of tourists out and about, buying masks, murano glass vases, beads, and serious knick knacks you see everywhere. Some stood wearily studying maps and then looking up and all around. If you stayed on the main trails, like to the Rialto Bridge and St. Marks Square, you would be bombarded by gondoliers standing in black, wide-brimmed hats and red and white striped shirts asking if anyone would like to ride in the gondolas on the canal. You'd see high end shops, like Versace, and Armani. You'd see people selling squishy toys, and tourists endlessly posing and draping themselves against or over something to have a photo taken. Then, there are the caffe owners who come out to get (trap) you the minute you accidentally paused for a second. The laminated menus in these tourist areas are printed in four languages, and look like a menu from an Asian restaurant back home.
When we were planning our holiday, we heard of Cantina do Mori in the San Polo area from a Rudy Maxa travel DVD. It featured the oldest wine bar in Venice, and of course, was not to be missed. We finally found this tiny, dark little Cantina. It was a fun place to visit, and small sandwiches and appetizers were served. Old copper pots hung from the ceiling, and old, dusty wine bottles sat on shelves. I would say this is one of those places that would be off the beaten track. After this, we decided to return to our room for a bit of a break, so we walked back through narrow little streets and when you looked down, you noticed small slits cut into the pavement. These are for drainage. When the tide comes in, the water rises in the canal, and floods doorways and some streets. When the tide goes out, these slits provide drainage and things dry up again. Or, if there is a lot of rain, they function to drain excess water.
When we reached our room, we sat in the sun on our teensiest balcony, watching the boats chug quietly along the sparkling water beneath us. At one point, the water taxi pulled up to the hotel doorway, and delivered two new tourists along with mounds of luggage. I couldn't believe it when I looked down and could see schools of fish in the water. I did not think a single thing could survive in the water, but not so! A beautiful, black bird with a large plume floated along, then dove, stayed submerged and bobbed up again with a fish in it's mouth - and was so intriguing to watch. We were sure he knew we were watching him, because he turned around and swam by in his dignified fashion again.
After our chill time, we walked to a caffe on San Barnaba Square, and shared a pizza, before going to the Vivaldi concert. The weather was sunny and warm all day, but turned gray and chilly as we ate our pizza. While we were there, two tourists with backpacks drove by on bicycles - stopping, and starting, weaving and wobbling so as not to run over anyone. These are the first bicycles that we've seen in Venice.
A man sauntered across the piazza and positioned himself just so, near the caffe. He wore army fatigues, running shoes with red laces, sunglasses and a bandana, and decided to serenade everyone around. He sang off tune, and whistled loudly in a very high pitch. Then he would stop and speak and laugh to someone in his own private world. People hurriedly walked by, paying no attention...and then just as suddenly as he had appeared, he was gone.
We walked through the much calmer streets to the Vivaldi concert. It was a beautiful, spectacular event, and the music was heavenly - four violins, one viola, one cello, and contrabass. We sat in the front row and centre. The concert was sold out. We left and walked through the streets, over the bridges, and talked about how gifted and talented some people are. We stopped at a shop for water and as we were coming out the talented musicians that we had just listened to, walked by carrying their instruments and holding umbrellas. They were talking and laughing and then disappeared around a corner...