Visit Venice is alway nice …

Excursions, places, personages, events

… Visiting Venice is always nice …

After a “good morning”, “how are you?”, “did you sleep well?”, “are your shoes comfortable?”, you can set off to discover Venice.Venice is there, always the same and different, floating like a big “fish” on its 118 islands.

In the summer it is always invaded by tourists, but don’t worry: as soon as you enter the labyrinths of the calli, as if by magic, they disappear;

we will always find places where there will be visitors similar to us: curious, avid for beauty in search of moments of happiness to take with us and which will come to mind, when we need to be happy again like that day in Venice: in front of a Madonna of the Bellini, in front of a distant church or in a field alone to warm up in the winter sun.

It’s already winter,

and it is precisely in the period from late autumn until the arrival of the Carnival tourists that one could meet the mythical poet Brodski in Venice.

Those in love with Venice recommend only these 3-4 months of winter.

If you choose the poet as an excuse to see the city, you will visit Brodski’s places in Venice.

If you choose your favorite painter in Venice, your guide will lead you in search of the places where his paintings are found, almost all of Venice: Titian’s itinerary in Venice, or Tiepolo and the Venetian 18th century, Carpaccio and Venice, … (Tintoretto, Veronese) so even if you want to get to know Gothic Venice, Renaissance Venice, …

Visit Venice on a theme

it can be stimulating, less routine if accompanied by stops in the famous bacari (osterie) to taste local specialties or drink Veneto wine, meeting the Venetians who are increasingly, too, the great curiosity, given that they are decreasing.

The places of Casanova

An always interesting theme is Giacomo Casanova and his time, looking for Casanova’s places, getting to know the costumes, furniture, fabrics and leisure places of the Venetian 18th century.

Music places

starting from the church of San Marco, musical chapel of the Doges of Venice, church and music hall with a stop in a private palace to hear a small concert.

Dress up in period costume

You can always dress in a period costume and stroll around the city or in a gondola, arousing the curiosity of tourists and thus transported into past eras to go to dinner with a Venetian countess. You can stay with the countess in a private house instead of a hotel.

Visit the islands of the lagoon

outside the usual tourist itinerary: San Giorgio with the view from the bell tower, the best view of the city; then San Lazzaro, the Armenian island, San Francesco del Deserto and then ending up on the fishermen’s island, Burano, to eat good fish..

Visit the palaces

Another idea: visit the palaces: Ca’ Rezzonico, Ca’ Labia, Ca’ d’Oro.

Then another idea will come to us when we visit Venice together, perhaps to drop by and have a cup of tea with friends.

We love Venice and you will certainly love it very much.

Unknown Venice

Eating a salad and two spaghetti on the terrace of the Danieli hotel and looking at the San Marco basin from a bird’s eye view, listening to the history of Venice and then leaving to visit through unknown Venice the churches full of masterpieces, funeral monuments of the Doges, San Zaccaria , SS. Giovanni e Paolo, Miracoli, Frari, Salute, Redentore, San Giorgio, San Giorgio dei Greci, Gesuati, Gesuiti; or the ancient Ghetto with its 4 synagogues, Italian, Spanish, French and German.

Padua and the Venetian villas

Hop over to Padua to see Giotto’s frescoes and the church of San Antonio.

See the Venetian villas along the Brenta: Malcontenta, Maser, Rotonda and follow Palladio, the Renaissance architect.

Ducal Palace

Never forget Palazzo Ducale full of history and works of art (Tintoretto, Veronese, Tiepolo, Tiziano) and the Correr museum which documents the Venetian civilization very well.

Venetian craftsmanship

visit to the atelier of ancient fabrics, Bevilacqua, visit to the squero, the atelier of the gondolas, or of the masks, atelier of lace and lace (stitch in the air, masterpiece, lace

Venice in celebration

It is essential to see Venice in celebration:

-Carnival in February;

-Redentore on the third Saturday of July: fireworks, dinner on the boat;

-Historical regatta on the first Sunday of September to see historic boats and people in period costumes;

– Film Festival (10 days) true auteur film, in theaters with the directors and protagonists of the films in competition;

-November 21 great feast of Santa Maria della Salute to place the candle wishing health and healing to loved ones;

-in December at Christmas for the Christmas sales: the magical atmosphere of the magical illuminations.

Alas, the only drawback, there is no nightlife, except for a “Casanova” disco and the “Martini” café, but you can always sit in Piazza San Marco listening to excellent music, or in a gondola with your own serenade.

Joseph Brodsky (1940-1996)

The places where he lived:

Pensione Accademia, Fondamenta Bollani, Londra Palace, Palazzo Marcello in Fondamenta della Verona, San Fantin including Palazzo Mocenigo where Byron also lived.

He arrives in Venice in 1972. He lives every year in winter in Venice in hotels, then in apartments and finally with Venetian patrician friends.

“The city that would surpass this city of water would be a city built in the air.”

Here the poet was at home. Sitting on the steps of the train station just arrived on a cold winter night with a starry sky, looking at the Grand Canal, he thinks that everything – the smell of seaweed on the water-soaked steps, the clear cold sky – reminded him of his homeland, all that was missing was “the crowing of the rooster to believe you have arrived home”.

He could be seen sitting on the Zattere, the famous bank on the Giudeca Canal, warming himself in the warm sun alone or with someone, capturing the rare moments of happiness.

Not far away we recommend a stop in the church of the Gesuati to see Tiepolo or the beautiful cycle dedicated to Sant’Orsola all’Accademia (Carpaccio) or the Tempesta by Giorgione.

The water, the mirror of the city “the mirror of itself” as in St. Petersburg, the seagulls themselves, brothers of those of the Baltic, waiting for the food thrown by the tourists from the vaporettos.

A small photo of Venice under the snow in the Life newspaper, a fragment of tapestry with the Doge’s Palace, a gondola that his grandfather had bought in China (which perhaps Marco Polo had brought there? ), a projection of “Death in Venice” of Visconti ensured that he promised himself one day to arrive in Venice.

In Venice you have to let yourself be swallowed up by the fog that makes places timeless, leave the room and then run back in the same trail left in the fog otherwise you are lost.

The places of worldliness

bar at the Gritti (chic 5-star lux hotel on the Grand Canal – opposite the Salute), an inevitable cocktail at the Guggenheim, the terrace of the museum where the wealthy collector had her house now a museum of modern art – a beautiful garden where she is buried with his dogs.

The high water

The last show: high water. The city knee-deep in water; walking in boots or on the catwalks.

To see Venice reflecting itself, real and surreal, the true, and the false image of the same church of San Marco which is now underwater for four months a year!!

The islands.

Itinerary number one in Venice would be a visit to Torcello, the dawn of the history of Venice begins with an inscription on the stone, 639, the date of the construction of the church of Santa Maria, Torcello’s cathedral.

There you can still feel all the past centuries, in the silence of the ruins with five or six houses and the famous Cipriani restaurant, loved by Hemingway; there were Cyril and Methodius; there are only the Roman stones brought from the mainland by the Venetian ancestors who, fleeing from the barbarians, sought safety on the island.

Opposite the island of Torcello stands the island of San Francesco, an oasis of peace and Franciscan spirituality in the lagoon, not visited by tourists, there is still the tree planted by San Francesco.

Always in front of the Franciscan island is the fishermen’s island, Burano, small, colorful, with small fishermen’s houses, colored in green, blue, pink, pistachio, where the famous “point in the air” lace is still made. Burano lace famous all over the world.

Here we also recommend a stop for lunch, in the restaurants with fresh fish and a friendly atmosphere. All the restaurants are museums of painting, famous painters paid with their works. There are no hotels, but many tourists who come and go during the day.

Finally, the island of San Lazzaro, an oasis of Armenian culture in the heart of the lagoon, with the old monastery and the church, excellent for weddings, full of mosaics like San Marco. Library with the oldest illuminated manuscripts in the world, a Byzantine mummy and the room of Byron who went swimming to write his verses on the island with the Mekhitarist fathers.

Fabrics, laces, masks, gold, glass, mosaics …

Bevilacqua atelier,

old atelier of fabrics, soprarizzi and damasks, with an 18th century loom, is located not far from the church of San Zan Degolà (San Giovanni Decollato). We visit upon request, if the customer is also interested in buying.

Not far away, very beautiful, the Campo San Giacomo da l’Orio, with the church, with the open-air restaurants, very Venetian, with real Venetians!! What a rarity, they are a part of the just 64,000 residents of the historic centre, they love to spend their time outdoors in the fields, small Venetian squares, very theatrical with the church, the water well and the surrounding houses.

Venetian lace

they are almost everywhere, but the heart of lace is the island of Burano, forty minutes away by boat or public boat.

The mask shops:

real laboratories where they tell you the story of the mask, the Carnival and the masquerade, true works of art, handmade, gilded, decorated, expensive, but unique.

The goldsmith’s art:

an infinite number of goldsmith shops – workshops of goldsmith artisans who work behind the windows, engrossed in carving precious stones, painting small icons of the Madonna Nicopeia, the Byzantine icon of the church of San Marco – and an infinite number of antique dealers.

The glass factories:

almost everywhere, but above all glass is sold on the island of Murano, glass is blown, the master glassmaker willingly lends itself to showing tourists how a unique and unrepeatable piece is made before your eyes.

The Orsoni mosaics

And finally the Orsoni mosaics, the same mosaics found in the church of San Marco, in glass paste, which are used to decorate the bathrooms, floors, gold mosaics to create precious environments, with gold leaf imprisoned between two pieces of glass , eternal material