Venice - Part 1

We left Florence @ 3:30 on Wednesday to take the train to Venice. I was looking forward to seeing the Tuscan countryside. unfortunately except for rare seconds, the train wen through tunnels for about the first 45 minutes! We chose our hotel to be close to the train station & they have built a new bridge across the Grand Canal to get there easily. Well if you are walking, easy...not easy with luggage as 51 steps up and 52 steps down. You would have thought that they would have built a ramp on the side but no! A luggage porter approached us and asked to take our luggage. We decided it was well worth the price to save our backs.

Venice is amazing! It is a made up of 117 small islands with 100 canals measuring around 25 miles &  approximately 400 bridges.the palaces built on the Grand Canal are protected from any changes by law. One guidebook said that many are now vacant & others have grand chandeliers above mossy, empty ground floors. The buildings are built on 15' pine piling a onto a bed of clay. Venice, while one of few Italian cities not influenced by the Roman Empire, was the result of the fall of Rome. The inhabitants of the mainland escaped to the islands to evade the invading barbarians. It was a major trading port between the east and west. In 1450 it had more citizens than Paris.

On Thursday we bought a 2 day pass for the water buses (Vaporetti), the best value in town. We started with a ride on the Grand Canal to Piazza San Marco to get our bearings. We were happy to see that it wasn't flooded. The last time we were here, there were elevated walkways & major flooding! Because of the flooding, you couldn't enter the Basilica. The line was short for Basilica do San Marco so we decided to take the tour.

You first climb a steep set of stairs to go to the museum. There are two balconies, one inside for overlooking the interior of the church. The other, the Loggia overlooks Piazza San Marco. There are copies of bronze horses. The real bronze horses are inside and have an interesting history. They were
made during the reign of Alexander the Great. Nero took them to Rome then Constantine took to his
new capital of Constantinople. Venetians stole them for the Basicilica. Napoleon stole them in 1797 for his triumphal arch at the Louvre. The French did return them in 1815. I'm not sure if this is "have horse, will travel" story or so much for one of the Ten Commandments! Thy shall not steal was not a lesson followed for the Basilica. You can see examples of the mosaics close up in the museum as well as needlepoint tapestries & ancient music sheets that were approximately 18 x 30".

Rick Steves describes the Basilica as "Early Ransack"!  It started back in the 13th century when 2 merchants stole the bones of St. Mark to rescue them from Moslem occupied Alexandria & brought them back to Venice. The first church burned down in 976. The current structure was started in the 11th century with materials looted from the Venetian Empire. Venetians would rent ships to the
Crusaders in exchange for money & looted booty.

The most amazing part of this structure are the mosaics which were used as teaching aids to the illiterate masses. There are 43,000 sq ft of mosaics! It was still cloudy when we entered. The sun came out & it looked like someone had turned a spotlight on! The mosaics just gleamed! The Golden Alterpiece has 80 enamels set in gold decorated with rubies, emeralds, pearls, amethysts & topaz.