Venice really needs no introduction. This incomparable union of art, architecture and lagoon-based living has been a fabled destination for centuries.
No matter how many photographs, films or painting’ you’ve seen, the reality is more surprising than you could ever imagine.
Imagine the audacity of deciding to build a city of marble palaces on a lagoon. Instead of surrendering to the acque alte (high tides) like reasonable folk might do, Venetians flooded the world with vivid paintings, baroque music, spice-route cuisine and a canal’s worth of spritz, the city’s signature prosecco-based cocktail.
Never was a thoroughfare so aptly named as the Grand Canal, reflecting the architectural glories lining its banks. The city that made walking on water seem easy remains as unique and remarkable as it ever was.
Today, cutting-edge architects and billionaire benefactors are spicing up the art scene, and culinary traditions are being kept alive and continually tweaked in restaurants scattered along quiet canals and far-flung islands.
Soak all day in this puddle of elegant decay. Venice is Europe’s best-preserved big city. This car-free urban wonderland of a hundred islands – laced together by 400 bridges and 2,000 alleys – survives on the artificial respirator of tourism.
Born in a lagoon 1,500 years ago as a refuge from barbarians, Venice is overloaded with tourists and is slowly sinking (not because of us tourists). In the Middle Ages, the Venetians because Europe’s clever middlemen for East-West trade and created a great trading empire.
By smuggling in the bones of St. Mark (San Marco) in AD 828, Venice gained religious importance as well. With the discovery of America and new trading routes to the Orient, Venetian power ebbed.
But as Venice fell, her appetite for decadence grew. Through the 17th and 18th centuries, Venice partied on the wealth accumulated through earlier centuries as a trading power.
Today, Venice is home to fewer than 55,000 people in this old city, down from about twice that number just three decades ago. While there are about 270,000 people in great Venice (counting the mainland, not counting tourists), the old town has a small-town feel, and locals seem to know everyone.
Venice is expensive for residents as well as tourists because everything must be shipped in and hand-trucked to its final destination. We found that the best way to enjoy Venice is to succumb to its charms, accept that prices are higher than on the mainland, and blow through a little money. 😊 It’s a unique place that’s worth paying a premium to fully experience.
We’ll be here for three nights and two full days. We’ll be taking in as much as we can, so there will be plenty of posts to pour over. 🙂
The secret to Venice? Escape the Rialto-San Marco tourist zone and savor the town early and late, without the hordes of vacationers day-tripping in from cruise ships and nearby beach resorts. A 10-minute walk from the madness puts you in an idyllic Venice that few tourists see.
The island city of Venice is shaped a bit like a fish. Its major thoroughfares are canals. The Grand Canal winds through the middle of the fish, starting at the mouth where all the people and food enter, passing under the Rialto Bridge, and ending at St. Mark’s Square (Piazza San Marco).
Venice is a carless kaleidoscope of people, bridges, and odorless canals. It’s made up of more than a hundred small islands – come along with us as we wander a few… and take in its sites.
