Italy Day 8: Murano & Venice
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Murano
docked sailboats on the way to Murano
Early this morning after breakfast, we took a boat ride over to the island of Murano. This island is very famous for the beautiful glass that is blown there. We saw a demonstration of this very old art form. There are only about four glass blowing businesses left there nowadays.
Don’t ask me how exactly, but this guy took a little sand, silica, and coloring, then heated it way up in a furnace. Next, he spun it around and stretched it (creating a shape) with some tools, and then blew strong puffs of air into the tube to create a very pretty vase. Hence the glass blowing … duh! Simply amazing!
These little gems can cost upwards of thousands of dollars! There were showrooms where you could purchase glass blown items. It was like a shark feeding frenzy, only the sharks were women and the chum was glass jewelry. I had to leave, it was so overwhelming.
On our trip, our tour guide was sporting a marvelous lime green, three stranded, authentic Murano necklace that cost about $360 Euro or about $500 U.S. dollars. That instantly blew my desire to find and purchase one similar to it. People on our tour were saying she must get quite a hefty kick back for taking us there, especially since she was grabbing some earrings and such to go with it. Hmmmmm, quite some nice perks!
Venice
After Murano, we were once more boating back to Venice for a day to do what we pleased. Along the walk to St. Mark’s Square, we saw Lord Byron’s Bridge of Sighs, which connects the Doges’ Palace to the Prisons.
Bridge of Sighs
This bridge got its name because of the prisoners who were condemned to death. When they walked over it on the way to be executed, they stopped and looked out over the waters of Venice one last time, and sighed. Although we didn’t see the Leaning Tower of Piza this trip, we did see the “Leaning tower of Venice,” as you can see in the photo.
leaning tower of Venice
I absolutely loved this Dolce & Gabbana wall mural on the side of this ancient building. It was such irony, but I thought it looked very cool indeed!
huge, absolutely huge!
The first thing we did in Venice was to go to the top of the Basilica of St. Mark. The actual Basilica didn’t open to the public until 1:00, but we were able to peek into it from the top walkways of the museum. This was a Byzantine Basilica and all the art work was done with millions of little mosaic tiles.
Everything here in Italy is so old and majestic! After the Basilica of St. Mark, we ate a picnic lunch in the shade beside it. Then we were off and about with the millions of other tourists exploring and enjoying the maze of Venice in the blistering heat.
There was an old gypsy beggar outside this church. In Italy you can go into any church you please, although some famous ones restrict your photography and dictate your dress code.
The Rialto bridge is just as lovely on land, as it is when you’re in a boat going under it.
Apparently eel is quite the delicacy in Italy. This shop owner tried to make a nice display with fruit and a lemon in it’s mouth, but as you can see, it is still horrid-looking! Gross!
There were many cart venders on the walkways. By 3:00 we were hot and tired, so we got on a boat to return to Lido for a quiet evening.
little sidewalk cafe on Lido
Dinner tonight was at a little cafe on the main street in Lido. We shared a spicy sausage pizza that was very good, along with a bottle of water that cost $3.60 Euro – ridiculous! They almost never brought out tap water.
The sunset that night was outstanding, so we walked over to the pier and took lots, and lots, of photos of the sunset over Venice.
Molto bella!
Another amazing day in Italy! We fell into a deep slumber in order to be ready for Bologna and Florence tomorrow.
Buonasera – good evening!