Category: Food (Page 5 of 8)

Well, I have to say, Venice caught my attention, and personally I loved it. Different, unusual, beautiful, quirky, well looked after and maintained, scenic, colourful, busy, aimed at tourists yet full of Italians, and most importantly, it is romantic. Sights, sounds, smell and colours are outstanding.

When the sun is out, the colours of buildings almost sparkle, the canals glow green and blue, the gondoliers’ chatter echoes around the alleyways and despite the amount of tourists buzzing around, the place is quiet, sometimes eerie, sometimes acceptably noisy with chatter or music coming from apartments overhanging the streets or canals; the smells are of garlic, pizza, grilled meat, wine and beer, fresh sea water, not stinky smells as there may have been years ago. The place is sparklingly clean, an army of cleaners empty dustbins and sweep streets every half an hour in peak season!

The buildings are ornate, aged, colourful, interesting and different, not two buildings are the same. The Lagoon is always an aqua green colour and the views coming from the Cavallino peninsular to Venice was always stunning, one of my favourite images is of the skyline of Venice with its two towers.

The Cavallino peninsular is quite unusual, about 35 miles long, with 30 camping “villages” and about 20 hotels on the left, all edging out onto the Adriatic sea; on the right are lush agricultural fields inbetween small shopping centres, caravan storage area and huge car parks, where tourists gather for a coach journey to the port at the bottom of the island (Porto Sabbioni) to cross over to Venice.

Our camp site was accommodating and comfortable, the restaurant served fabulously tasty meals and the barman met with David’s approval, introducing him to Japanese whiskey! They opened a side gate for us to exit rather than zig zagging around parked cars and tree trunks!

We moved onto Trieste after 4 weeks in the area, leaving with happy memories and feel we would happily return again.

Love is in the Air in Venice

Typical Venetian Scenes…..

Cavallino campsite

Visit to Venice Part 2 was with Charlotte and Robin, they came to Venice for the weekend, arriving on the Friday in the rain!  Luckily Saturday was sunny and dry and warm, so we were able to do the full tourist thing….

Drinkies in St Mark’s Square (at an extortionate price) served by liveried waiters and with a band playing in the back ground, a visit to San Marco’s Cathedral, a tour of the canals on a Gondola, a visit to the Hard Rock café for a cocktail and then a tour of the Doge’s Palace, a magnificent Palace built in 1340, extended and reconstructed several times following fires up to the 18^th century.

St Mark’s Square

Venice in the sun.

The Doge’s Palace

The title “doge” was the title of the senior-most elected official of Venice (and Genoa) and was the equivalent of a Duke without being a Duke.  A Palace was built on the site of the current Palace in the 9^th Century but was destroyed by fire in the 10^th century.  Over the centuries, it was home to the Great Council, the Council of Ten and the Senate who all served the Doge.

Before the 12th century there were holding cells within the Doge’s Palace but during the 13^th, 14^th and 15th centuries layouts were changed to increase the number of cells.  Due to the dark, damp and isolated qualities they were known as the Pozzi (the Wells)  In 1591 more cells were built and due to their position, directly under the lead roof, they were known as Piombi.  The cells were covered in lapped larch and basic, with little light or air.

The current building was linked to the prison on the other side of the Canal by The Bridge of Sighs, a two way tunnelled bridge, linking the magistrate’s courts in the Palace to the Prison. 

The famous name of the bridge dates from the “Romantic period” and was supposed to refer to the sighs of prisoners who, passing from the courtroom to the cell in which they would serve their sentence, took a last look at freedom as they glimpsed the lagoon saying “I will never again see my beautiful Venice”.

The internal courtyard is surrounded by the palace and St. Mark’s Basilica, which used to be the Doge’s chapel, in the centre of the courtyard stand two well-heads from the mid-16th century.

In 1485, the Great Council decided that a ceremonial staircase should be built within the courtyard, called the Giants’ Staircase. The design included alternate bands of Istrian stone and red Verona marble to create one single monumental approach from the Piazza right into the heart of the building. Since 1567, the Giants’ Staircase is guarded by two colossal statues of Mars and Neptune, which represents Venice’s power by land and by sea, and therefore the reason for its name. Members of the Senate gathered before government meetings in the Senator’s Courtyard, to the right of the Giants’ Staircase.

The Gondola Ride.

General views.