Venice

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Ah, Venice! This has got to be the most beautiful city I have seen on this trip - if not the most beautiful city I've ever seen PERIOD! I absolutely LOVED my day in Venice!

We rode our bus from the hotel to a port. Since Venice is actually a series of about 120 islands connected together by bridges, the only way to get there was by boat. We got on our boat just as a bunch of people were arriving to start some sort of demonstration. That was an interesting sight! As we rode on the boat, I took many pictures because I was so surprised by the absolute beauty of the scenery that was unfolding before me. We arrived and disembarked the boat and began walking toward the Doge's Palace. Doge was the title given to the Duke, or ruler, of Venice throughout much of its history. The Doge wore a funny hat, which I think looks a bit like a hollowed out squash. Anyway, the Doge's Palace was nothing short of impressive. It looks fairly plain from the outside, but inside there are wonderful things to see everywhere you look. Not only was the palace the home of the Doge and his family, but it was also the seat of government. The palace included a chamber where the entire legislative body would meet to decide important matters, a judicial chamber in which trials would occur, and an enormous hall in which large meetings and celebrations could take place. The palace also connects to a prison which is reached by crossing the famous Bridge of Sighs, so named because condemned prisoners could look out of a window in the bridge to catch their final glimpse of the beautiful city of Venice and sigh before being led off to execution.

After leaving the Doge's Palace, we went directly next door to St. Mark's Basilica (San Marco). The basilica was built in the 10th and 11th centuries, and is considered to be one of the best surviving examples of Byzantine architecture. It is quite a sight to behold! You just look at it and can tell that it is very, very old and impressively built to have survived all these years. Tradition holds that the basilica houses the remains of St. Mark the Evangelist. There are marvelous mosaics and gold everywhere you look inside this building. As we were leaving the basilica, it started to rain for about 20 minutes. This was literally the only rain we had to endure on our ENTIRE trip to Italy!

At this point we split off into groups for free time the rest of the day. I again went off with the Stokes group, and we had a great time. We went to have lunch (to escape the rain), and after that we went back to San Marco Square to find the museums that we had heard so much about. We were not disappointed! The museums we walked through were full of interesting paintings, sculpture, military artifacts, books, and so much more! We also walked through a special exhibit of paintings by American artist John Singer Sargent, who is known for his portraits and some impressionist paintings. He lived in Venice for a time, and painted many scenes from the city. It was a beautiful exhibit.

After leaving the museum, we spent a little while in San Marco Square having coffee and watching all of the people feeding the pigeons. We were a bit surprised to see some people putting breadcrumbs on their arms, in their hands, and even in their hair so the (dirty) pigeons would land on them to eat. They thought this was very entertaining and took many pictures of it. We thought it was kind of unclean and disgusting, but to each his own! We then just wandered around the streets, peering into the various shops as we passed. We wound up back by the water, where we found the church that Antonio Vivaldi worked in (though it was closed) and finally sat down for dinner. After dinner, we met the rest of our group and traveled back to our hotel for the night. Ah, Venice!

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