Wed 18 Feb 2009
*****Friday: continued*******
Walking through Venezia at 6 a.m. was pretty surreal. When we figured out the business with the Twilight Zone Train (no one understood exactly what went down, but the kids stuck at Mestre found a connecting train that got them to the island from the mainland about 20 minutes later), our giant mass began to head through the streets of Venezia towards the other side of the island and San Marco. Why not?
On one of the windy canal-lined streets, in the dark, an intense aroma of fresh baked bread surrounded us. Chris, Amy and I slowed when we smelled it, but the others kept their pace. Could this be a middle-of-the-night bread-baking facility, with insanely delicious pane much like we find at 3 a.m. in Viterbo? Well, we were hungry, it was around 6 a.m. on an island tourist city that we knew nearly nothing about, so we figured, why not knock on the door and see if they'll sell us some bread?
The others were a bit ahead, but we knocked. A woman in a bob and an apron answered.
"Posso comprare pane?" Chris asked.
"Si si!" the woman replied.
A loaf of their version of pane bianca was 40 cents. It was hard on the outside–we're pretty sure we got older bread and not the ones we were smelling–but soft, fresh and baked with salt on the inside. And since the bread in Viterbo is almost 100% not made with salt, this was a welcome change. And a delicious breakfast.
After walking for quite some time, we made it to the Ponte Rialto. When I got back to this bridge on Saturday, I could barely believe it was the same place. On Friday, less than an hour before sunrise, we were the only souls on the entire massive bridge. All the stores were shut with their gates pulled down, made to look as though they didn't even exist there. The photos we shot of the view from the bridge (now up on Flickr!) were of a silent, peaceful, cloudless morning. The only people moving down below were quiet, not quite yet awake and on their ways to work.
After a pause on the bridge to take in the scenery and our bearings, we continued towards San Marco. It must have been less than 10 minutes before we arrived there, and it was gorgeous. The sun was just starting to rise and it's light was casting long shadows on certain parts of the building while illuminating others. The gold and blues built into the architecture were glowing from the sunlight, and a few pink street lamps that were shut off for the daytime appeared illuminated. We photographed San Marco, the piazza, the Doge palace. But the true sight was when we walked to the edge of the street where the Grand Canal started.
The sky had been quite light by this point, so I assumed the sun had already risen a decent amount. But as we turned the corner by the canal, we saw that yellow orb that you shouldn't look directly into peeking just over the edge of the horizon. It was fantastic. In that moment, Venezia became my favorite city. I love sunrises more than sunsets; they just seem more special, more promising. In that moment, I wanted to hug everyone. I was so happy to be in Venezia and my day was pretty much complete at that point.
We spent quite a few hours in that area by the canal after that. Chris, Amy, Nicole, Kelly and I found a table near a cafe on the canal, intermittently snoozing and basking in the sun and cloudless sky until the San Marco basilica opened at 9:45 a.m. It was a good thing we had been there to see it when we did, because even before 10 a.m. a decent sized line had already formed in front of it. Had we gone back on Saturday, with the line I saw then that must have been at least a quarter mile long, no joke, there's no way we would've gotten inside.
We didn't pay the euros to go upstairs, but the free view from looking on the ground floor was astonishing. The entire ceiling and much of the walls are covered in a mostly golf mosaic filled with biblical scenes and figures. We walked through, following the path created by the roped-off sections, with our heads tilted upwards the entire time, gazing with awe. I think I've said this about all the big churches I've been in so far, but it was absolutely incredible.
We spent a bit after that walking by some of the stands selling souvenirs by the canal and in the piazza. Most of the offerings were masks (for much cheaper than I had bought mine in Roma, of course) and lots of jewelry and other art made from Murano glass. On Saturday I finally broke down and bought a painting near the Grand Canal of San Marco for 10 euro, but it was worth it.
Around noon I met up with Kayla, Karrie and the other girls I was staying with to take the water bus back to the other side of the island and check into our hostel. Let's just sum up this part as a huge disappointment. Our "bed and breakfast" that a communication breakdown had lead me to believe was 25 euro a night turned out to be a 40 euro a night set of rooms within an apartment in a different location from where we checked in, shared with other people we didn't know and I saw only once, and "breakfast" was a basket full of cracker-bread, honey, the tiny containers of peach jam set on the table for you at IHOP, and a couple bags of tea and instant coffee. Suffice it to say I wasn't thrilled and I took most of the offerings back to Viterbo with me, mostly out of spite. Oh, and the bathroom for the room I was staying in was across the hall and required a separate key.
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