Venice - An Enchanting City Indeed!

Venice – An Enchanting City Indeed!

Venice , Italy

Years ago, when  I was a young girl studying in high school, I learned about The Merchant of Venice. Since then I have the desire to visit Venice one day. That day was today! Some forty years later after secondary school.  

Venice did not disappoint us.  Personally,  I think it’s the most beautiful city in the world! It’s unique, different from any city we have ever visited.

Instead of cars, Venetians have boats dock outside their houses

We had to take the train from Assisi back to Florence, then caught the 3:45 pm train to Venice and arrived there around 5:50pm.

 A one way train ticket from Florence to Venice – 48 Euro. 

We could have taken a later train and save about 20 Euro each person but that would mean arriving in Venice around midnight.

 We wanted to have as much time as possible in Venice so we took the earliest train possible.

From our hotel, we could walk everywhere.

We stayed two nights at Hotel Adua, a 5 minutes walk from the train station.


  I must thank my husband for researching and booking a hotel within walking distance to everything again.

Buying a 24 hour travel pass would allow visitors to see much more in Venice 

Venice has practically no cars; the main transportation is by boats , mostly city water bus. Tourist could buy a 12 hour travel pass ( 18 Euro ) which allowed us to go everywhere within Venice.

For 2 more Euro, at 20 Euro, a visitor could get a 24 hour travel pass, which is a much better deal if one is staying here for more than a day. We could have used a 24 hour pass and seen more places.

Ever wonder what happens when Venetians Open Their Doors to Their houses?

We absolutely enjoyed walking around Venice.

 It is a unique city unlike any other we have ever visited.

Bridges, Bridges, Everywhere!

The entire city has been built with most buildings, houses and old churches  fronting water.


There are obviously few drive ways or garages but docks for boats and bridges everywhere to help its inhabitants to get from one place to the other.

Looking at these beautiful houses surrounded by water everywhere and accessible by bridges only, we couldn't help but being amazed at how well these houses have stood the erosion of water throughout the centuries.

The first evening, we strolled around in our neighbourhood getting ourselves familiarized with the city. Night life is always interesting in Italy especially famous cities where tourist frequent.

The night view of Venice is breathtaking. It was just beautiful walking around, coming across small bridges every few steps, watching lights reflecting on the water,  passersby ( we were one of them)  pausing to admire the beauty of the night scenery by these bridges, being lost and totally enveloped by this surreal setting contented to just let  time go by and wishing this magical moment could be frozen and last till eternity.

Venice at Night

Tired from walking, we sat down on a bench under a tree. There was a gentleman sitting close by and we started chatting. I asked him if he could speak English and yes he replied. It was nice to meet a fellow traveller and exchanged information and experience about our travels. Ron, from Holland, was the one who told us about the visitor’s pass.

Ron enjoys travelling in Italy so much that he has been coming here every year for the past seven years, staying a month in Florence and a week in Venice. ( That’s a great idea! I would like to stay in Italy for a month in my next holiday too! ) 

It was a lovely night and we talked about travels, different cultures in different cities and discussed the economic crisis in Europe and everything. It was simply an enjoyable conversation. In fact we had such a good time that Ron invited us to visit him in Holland and we exchanged email address.   It is positive experience such as this, i.e, meeting people and learning about different cultures and people that make travelling one of our most favourite things to do!

R.T. Venice, Italy
Aug. 2012

Assisi - A Beautiful Medieval Town

 Assisi, Italy

City Gate, Assisi, Italy

From our hotel, we took a bus at the town square to Assisi. ( 1 Euro / person)  The ride took ten minutes and we found ourselves in the middle of a medieval town!

Thanks to my husband who is passionate about history and insisted that we should visit Assisi on our European trip. I was glad that we did. I learned a lot about European history and that Assisi is the town where St. Francis was born and died.

The Basilica of St. Francis - World Heritage Site since 2000

The Basilica of St. Francis which was built to honour St. Francis who gave up his wealthy life style and dedicated his life to helping the poor, also a patron saint of Italy,
has been a World Heritage Site since 2000 and it is a sight to behold!

The Basilica sustained heavy damages in the 1977 earthquakes, but it was restored and re-opened after two years. The restoration was a  hefty $50 millions.

The small, compact town is surrounded by a completely intact city wall with gates. When we looked up, we saw a fortress occupying the highest point of the town which is dominated by two castles. The larger one called Rocca Maggiore, with its massive presence meant to intimidate the people of the town. It was built in the 1300's.

Within thirty minutes of walking, we could go from one end of the town to the other.





We admired the Gothic architecture everywhere, including this little cafe where we took our lunch break.

Enjoying the scenery by a hill side cafe 

Assisi is a city built high on the hill that offers  beautiful view of the towns and fields below. We had dinner by a hillside cafe, soaked in this spectacular scenery and took numerous pictures at this fairy tale location.

We attended a lovely evening concert - started at 9:15p.m.  in the courtyard of the Basilica of St. Francesco.

The title of the concert was Ave Maria and no less than fourteen different versions of this song by various composers throughout the different periods and sung with gusto by the choir.

It was a hot night with hardly any breeze and we had to fan ourselves constantly.

Night View of an Assisi Street

After the concert, we strolled around the streets of Assisi, taking in the scenery and experiencing the quiet life of a small Italian hillside town.






 

The street corner where St. Francis slept

We even saw the corner where St. Francis called home after his decided to give up his wealthy life and lived like one of the poor people in his time.


I was so glad that my husband arranged  for us to visit  this exceptional well preserved beautiful town and allowed us a glimpse of what a medieval town looked and felt like during the medieval ages.


R.T. Assisi, Italy
Aug. 2012

Climbing the 500 Steps of the Tower at Duomo, Florence

Before we left Florence for Assis, we did do one thing that was really cool - climbing the steps of the Campanile Bell Tower at Duomo.

We only had the morning here in Florence, so we made sure we went to visit the Duomo which was just a few minutes’ walk from our hotel. Morning starts early in Italy; the sky starts getting bright around 5:30am and by the time it is 10ish, you could really feel the heat and scorching power of the sun.

Candle stands in the church

We visited the beautiful church and then

 climbed up the Campanile Bell Tower which has a narrow staircase made up of about 500 steps. The admission charge to climb to the top of the tower was 8 Euros / person.

I, in particular just loved walking these steps. By accident, I discovered that walking up steps did wonder to my aching hamstrings.  So I took every opportunity to walk these steps.

 The steps were narrow and deep, at times, only 1 person could go through so we had to negotiate our way with other climbers before we continued. 

The View Through one Those Peek Holes in the Tower

 As we climbed higher, we were able to peek through a little opening inside the tower and marvel at the clarity that we could see much of Florence and its immediate area.  

View of Florence after we climbed up the 500 steps to the Bell Tower

We huffed and puffed our way higher and higher in the steamy heat taking breaks at each platform available. The heat was intense and we were sweating like pigs. Some older people were not having an easy time.


Finally we reached the top of the tower and from that vintage point we could see Florence all around us in 360 degrees. 

Florence - Looking through one of the windows

  



Looking from the top of the Bell Tower, we noticed that all the buildings below were quite uniform in the style and construction.  No modern buildings were in sight. There must be some very strict building codes in certain part of the city limiting the construction of new buildings.






 We were glad that at our age, we could still climb all the way to the top without great difficulty; once when we got there we had the feeling of exhilaration of being on top of everything.

With God's blessing, we may be able to walk the Camino in Spain again!

S. & R.T. 

Our Third Day in Florence 

Assisi - A Pleasant Surprise

Assisi, Italy

Assisi - A Town full of Medieval Buildings

I have no idea why my husband wanted to go to Assisi. Since he is the one who knows a lot about history and geography, and the one planning our trip, I trust him and go wherever he has planned for us with a few suggestions form me here and there. His efforts have really paid off because everyday on this trip has been a wonderful and new experience for the both of us. Visiting Assisi was another example of a great pleasant surprise!

Train is a marvelous way of traveling in Europe. It is comfortable, convenient and often can be very inexpensive.  We traveled to Assisi from Florence by train at 13.50 Euro per person. What a great bargain! We could not even buy gas at that price!

13.50 Euro/ person to take the train from Florence to Assisi ( there is no bus to this city )






 The train left at 6:15pm and we arrived at the Assisi Train Sation around 8:30pm. This time we did not book a hotel in the old town because we wanted a change. Since we arrived in Europe, we stayed at hotels that were right in the old town or within short distance to the railway station. This time, we wanted to experience what the suburb was like in Italy. The taxi to the hotel was not a long ride and it cost about 10-11 Euro.

Outdoor dining area at our hotel

We were in the village Santa Maria deghli Angeli and stayed in the Hotel Frate Sole.  The village of SMA is the first Italian small modern town which is planned around  the highway.  All other towns and cities which we have stayed are old settlements which are geared for walking  S.M.A. is a town dominated by a huge church with a golden statue of the Virgin Mary on top.





Since it was about 9 ish p.m., we ate dinner at the hotel restaurant. I ordered risotto and Stan ordered pasta. The menu was all in Italian so we took a gamble, ordered our dish but not exactly sure what would be served to us. I always like risotto but this time both of our dishes were a little too salty for our taste.

Full of Activities at the Square in front of the Church

After dinner, we went out to explore the town. It was only a five minute walk from our hotel to the town square where the church located. In front of the church,  we found young people playing balls, kids running around while others were sitting and talking to friends. We did not think that the church would be open at this hour. But it was.

We went into the church and it was dark inside with only a few candle like fixtures lit on the walls. Most of the people were sitting silently in darkness. We saw some fervent worshipers praying in a special enclosed sanctuary in front of the alter. I went up and prayed at that sanctuary. Everyone was very quiet, being respectful at a place of worship.

We came out after a few minutes and strolled along the town streets. We saw lots of people relaxing and talking to their friends or families in the town square.  Families, young kids, young people in groups, pilgrims in robes walking around. I was surprised to find little kids running around, riding their bikes, following their  parents while their parents, grandparent and the whole family were relaxing in the park at well past 11:00p.m. at night.   I personally know a few Canadian parents who are really sticky about their children's bedtime being at a certain time, e.g. 8 or 9 p.m and they would not go anywhere because of this.)

 It was a nice picture of people enjoying a night out in a peaceful little town.

 
S.& R.T., Assisi, Italy
Aug. 2012

The Uffizi Gallery, Florene - A Lesson in Art History

The Uffizi Gallery, Florence

The next morning, we ate a buffet breakfast at the hotel’s  4^th floor with a spacious terrace dining area. The best part about this breakfast was the provision of a variety of fruits for guests to choose from freshly squeezed orange juice. The juice was made by an orange juice making machine from which we merely pressed a button and an orange would be dropped  and cut into halves and fresh juices came out to the glass placed below. It was great to have fresh squeezed orange juice first thing in the morning. No wonder nobody complained about the other minor inconveniences at the hotel.

The hotel concierge printed out our emailed copy of tickets which we purchased online back in Canada for the Uffizi Gallery English Guided Tour. Good thing the tour started at 3:30pm so it gave us a lot of time to first explore the city a bit on our own.   

One of the Musicians Performing Outside Uffizi Gallery

The walk from our hotel to the Uffizi Gallery was about 10- 15 minutes. We knew that we reached an artsy place when we heard classical music before we reached the place. There were musicians playing classical instruments on the street;  some painters were painting portraits for customers and a few more were displaying their artwork right in front of the gallery.  We could feel  the spirit of arts in the air.

The English tour we signed up was at 3:30p.m. We still had to line up even though it said with this tour we could skip the line. We followed our guide to the Gallery, which housed a collection of large number of paintings dated from the late Medieval to late Renaissance period. 

Artists displaying and selling their art outside the gallery

It was interesting to learn that the Medici family was the ruling, very rich and influential family in Florence.  The Gallery was willed by the last Medici to the City of Florence.  The ruling family after the Medici’s had Austrian/German influence and organized the artworks meticulously by time period and type.  

 We learned that the pre-renaissance paintings had to be strictly religious and had to follow the Byzantine iconographic rules in creating the paintings.

  I was wondering  why were there so many paintings related to church. Now I know. All these paintings depicted ether the Madonna and the Christ Child or the Virgin Mary or Jesus by themselves, or the saints. 

 
 When
we came to the section of paintings when renaissance period began, we could see that painters stared to move away from iconic painting methods and experimented with perspectives and shades.  They also added ancient Greco Roman methods of realism onto their paintings. 










 The tour was very informational and we felt that we could earn a credit in Art History 101 after the tour.

Looking back, this tour gave us the tool to appreciate the fresco paintings at the Basilica San Francisco in Assisi where we also visited on this European trip. 

 

S.& R.T.  Our Second Day in Florence, Italy

Aug. 2012

Do People Ever Sleep in Florence, Italy?

From Siena to Florence, Italy 

We went to  our next destination, Florence,  in Italy in the early evening by bus.  The receptionist at the Canon D’oro Hotel in Siena was helpful and friendly. We chatted a little. He came from Cameroon, Africa and studied foreign languages  there at university. This explained his fluency  in English  and Italian. From the hotel in Siena where we stayed only for a few hours, it only took us a few minutes walking to the bus station.  ( My husband really did an excellent job researching all the locations of the hotels, making sure we were not too far from everything.)  The bus was already waiting and the lady bus driver nodded  when we asked if this bus was going to Florence.

Since we were the last two getting on the bus, the only seats left were two bench seats in the middle of the bus close to the door. It was fine with us as this was only a little more than an hour ride to Florence.  Because there was no proper storage space for our two suitcases  on this commuter bus, Stan and I had to hang on to them carefully. The ride gave us an opportunity to see the Italian countryside scenery.

The bus arrived at the Florence bus station at around 8:00pm but everything seemed to have closed there. Fortunately, the bus station was just across the street from the Train Station, we got a taxi from there easily and got to the hotel at around 9:00p.m.

FLORENCE

Florence at Dusk

We stayed at Hotel  Bodoni located very close to the major attractions. Our room was on the first floor but the Reception Area was on the 4^th floor, and each time when guests left the hotel, they had to hand in their room keys to the receptionist. A little inconvenient but nobody seemed to complain.

Ponte Vecchio at dusk - The most famous and romantic bridge in Florence

After unloading our luggage, we went out for a walk.  Florence also has a lot of medieval  narrow winding streets.  We kept walking on one street following the direction with the brightest lights.

  It was about 9:30pm.  In the square, there were people performing mime and drawing quite a crowd; young people sitting on the steps of the church;  patrons filled the outdoor cafés and the restaurants where American jazz music was playing was really busy; hawkers trying to sell their wares etc.

A busy place at that hour in the evening. 

 Musicians performing on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence

Florence has a number of bridges. Ponte Vecchio is a beautiful covered bridge lined with numerous shops and  houses. It is a well know landmark of Florence.  The view from the bridge is beautiful! It was said that Hitler liked this bridge so much that he ordered to have this bridge preserved while all the other bridges in Florence were bombed and destroyed during Nazi's invasion of the city.

One can see Ponte Vecchio often in postcards, magazines and artwork. It is a beehive of activities at night.

Ponte Vecchio - a very lively and busy place n Florence at night

We liked the ambiance and atmosphere so much that we went back to Ponte Vecchio on our second night in Florence.  There were always musicians performing on the bridge while a lot of young people just sitting down on the curb, hanging out and listening to the performers for hours.

Same thing as in the squares; lots of people were still strolling on the streets late at night. We wonder - Do people go to sleep in this city?

We were tired from the activities and  headed back to our hotel around 12:00a.m. but made the mistake of turning into one of the side streets and had a heck of time finding our way back.





These winding streets were like a maze and you could get lost easily there. A lesson was learned here – Always make sure we could locate the little street on our map before turning into there so that we could find our way back to the hotel.

R.T.  Florence, Italy

Aug. 2012