Sun 01.Jul.2012
Venice, Italy
Ancona, Italy is an industrial port city with little to offer a traveller. But it
is where the ferry from Croatia deposits you. It least it gets you there
first thing in the morning, so you have plenty of time to find a way up to
the train station, then negotiate a train ticket to almost anywhere else in Italy.
Where else in Italy? My goal in the country was to get the
night train to Vienna. You could do that from Rome. But it works
more easily, and with more time to spare, from Venice.
A no-brainer if ever there were one.
What is this? Classic figure? no visible arms?
It is Venice de Milo!
While people are reaching for tomatos to throw, let us distract their attention
with these marble columns from the front of the San Marco Basilica.
My memory insists that in about 1991, the colors in these columns were
much richer, more saturated. Have they really faded so much in the last 20
years, or are they just a bit dusty and unpolished?
There was an earthquake that morning near Bologna, which ended up delaying my
night train by two hours. But it had little effect on my mid-day connection
to Venice. Arrive at Santa Lucia station, slightly groggy from lack of sleep
on the ferry the night before; stash my baggage at the consigna, and plunge
into the maze of twisty little streets to enjoy this dazzlingly seductive
city, and hopefully find an Italian coffee.
I don't think I ever before saw a sign explicitly permitting this
particular act.
Or this one, let alone in a restaurant.
Around San Marco
After some wandering (and yes, some good Italian caffe macchiato), I made
my way down to Venice's great set piece, the Piazza San Marco. You have seen
pictures of it by pros in a zillion magazines and movies, so I am free to
concentrate on personal quirky observations.
As I was admiring the harbor from San Marco, a tug boat came by, towing
- surprise - a monster cruise ship, I believe from Costa Lines. I gathered
at the shore to gawk as the behemoth passed. As she approached, I realized
that every bit of space at her rails was occupied by passengers gawking at
us! Or at the Piazza behind us, and the city around us.
When you have paid for a ship cruise, Venice is a Big
Deal!
You can't stay forever at San Marco. I made my way westward through the
maze of streets, piazzas, footbridges, canals, etc, coming eventually to
my destination, the Accademia Bridge
People have taken to the practice here of leaving a padlock on the bridge.
The local lock shops must approve.
The view from the Accademia Bridge is as famous as those from San Marco or
the Rialto Bridge. You will surely agree it looks familiar.
Italy is famous for its ability to serve you a first-class dinner at a
first-class price. Venice is famous for your ability to get a mediocre
dinner no matter how much you pay.
You can take advantage of this
seeming problem; eat cheap in Venice - there is nothing to lose - and save
your food-splurging budget for more fertile territory.
The ability to sit outdoors in the evening breeze was all the extra I needed.
Remember cigarette machines? This one is built into a wall on the street,
as if it were an ATM.
Dinner and coffee gained me a second wind that did not last near as long as
the wait for my quake-delayed night train. I spent a few slightly desperate
hours on the plaforms at Mestre station, not daring to sleep, watching
the departures board as the size of the delay grew by stages from ten minutes
to seventy.
It did finally arrive though, and eventually depart. I shared a six-bunk
compartment with a family of five English-speaking Pakistanis from Dubai, who proved
to be good company the next morning on the last couple of hours, coming down out
of the Alps, and across the flatland into Vienna.
Contents Copyright 2012 Jeff Bulf