blög!: venezia

9-13. october
(click to enlarge)

watch for canaletto

panorama to the east from the Campanile. the set of domes belong to Basilica di San Marco and to the right is the Palazzo Ducale. the following pictures at ~9am.

panorama to the south. the tower on the left is part of the San Giorgio Maggiore. then the long skinny island is Lido and lastly the church on the right is Santa Maria della Salute. the naval ship chillin' there belongs to the italian navy.

panorama to the west. Piazza San Marco stretches out to the west. in the distance you can make out a cruis ship. everyday cruise ships come to venice; i saw up to 7 at once point. they crowd venice until about 5 and then everthing quiets down quite a bit.

my mom and i together in the Campanile

many ships are moored just past the Palazzo Ducale

contrast Piazza San Marco with the modern naval vessel. this one is really worth clicking on; watch especially for the long shadows of the tourists below.

Piazza San Marco. the puddles you see forming are due to the rising tide. an hour later you could not walk through the piazza any more because the water had risen.

Basilica di San Marco - the four horses atop the entrance have a fantastic history. they stem from 1st century a.d. greece where they stood atop a monument honoring nero in rome. in the 4th century they ended up in the byzantine empire only to be stolen from constantinople by the venetians during a crusade in 1204. napoleon passed along the favor and took them to paris in 1792, and but having looted them fair and square 6oo years earlier the venetians demanded their horses back and in 1815 they were returned. after a quick trip to rome during the first world war and padua during the second world war, they were finally moved inside the basilica in 1982. what you see there are just copies, but they really are magnificent in real life.

Canal Grande - in the bend you can see part of the Ponte di Rialto

Ponte di Rialto up closer

from the Ponte di Rialto. canaletto must have sat here when made his sketches

Piazza di San Marco. Campanile on the left and Palazzo Ducale on the right. bad weather kind of kills this pictures but view was also immortalized by canaletto. there are no buses in venice (there are no cars either for that matter) so all public transportation is on water buses (ie boats). the #1 and #82 will afford you this view.

Santa Maria della Salute at dusk

Murano
Murano is an island which consists entirely of factories in which glass is blown or otherwise sculpted. its sinfully expensive but generally worth the price

a water taxi took my mom and i to murano.

inside the shop.

this guys is making a cat out of a blob of glass. suchie has the cat that he made here, but she doesnt know it yet ;)

some small examples of what they make on murano

Burano
Burano is a small island that is a lot less touristy but really beautiful. all the house are the same size and are all painted bright colors. it makes for a very surreal little place. the campanile in burano is at least as crooked as the leaning tower in pisa

notice how high the water level is.

synopsis of burano

Torcello
Torcello is another island that was originally a bishop seat founded in 639. there is a basilica on Torcello which is built with heavy byzantine/eastern orthodox influence. the basilica Santa Maria Assunta and the smaller Santa Fosca next to it are extremely well preserved. unfortunately i could not take pictures inside but they are very very beautiful. the insidea are covered in golden mosaics.