Venice : A Long Day Out

“Happy birthday to you!" I know I’m not very musical but Y really does seem reticent for me to continue singing. It could be because it’s 6am and I’ve just woken her up, or it could be wariness about the long coach trip we have ahead of us today. Actually I think it’s just because she’s a bit of a grouch in the morning. She does however remember that I was going to get her a birthday cup of tea this morning.

The reason for our early start is that many months ago I booked a trip to Venice. Of course at the time I hadn’t realised we’d be hit by a heat wave, so instead of a pleasant 20°C we would be hitting a melting 33°C instead. Still there was no going back – unless we simply accepted we had lost the money.

The gasps were audible as we all calculated that was a journey time of five hours.

And so it was with a certain amount of trepidation we climbed aboard the coach and checked the status of the air-con (well you can’t be too careful). We then drove around some of the attractive hotels in Bled picking up more members of our trip, including the sisters we had met on our journey from Saltsburg, Marion and Barbara. They were looking very tanned and relaxed, not at all fazed by the temperature and already chatting up our young guide.

We spent a few minutes catching up on our respective weeks, comparing notes on what we had done. The ladies had put us to shame. Most startling of all was they had been on the dry toboggan run the day before. Without giving too much away, they are both a fair bit older than either Y or myself and we had looked at it in horror. These two game girls from Romford had done it twice! “Don’t worry” they said, “you’ll have time to do it tomorrow”. Somehow I think we may find an alternative source of fun.

Having picked up people from Bled and now having a captive audience, our guide Neot (probably not the correct spelling) broke the bombshell to us. We had two more pick ups and then we should arrive in Venice for 12 noon. The gasps were audible as we all calculated that was a journey time of five hours.

Now we did know it would be a long day, but the distance to Venice had been less than that to Saltsburg and that was three hours. Still it was too late now, we had ten hours of motorway ahead of us and just five in a sweltering Venice. The reason for this long drive became apparent as we collected the other passengers. We spent an hour and a half slowly winding our way around narrow mountain roads. I can’t help thinking we could have cut the journey down a bit.

Ah well nothing we can do now except chill out and go to a better place in our heads. Mind you we do stop at one very attractive hotel that we use for a loo break and it is tempting to hide in the glamorous bar area until the coach comes back later tonight. I wonder if they would miss me.

At last we make it to the motorways and we can put our foot down. As a slight bonus the motorway cuts through some of the most spectacular mountain countryside we have seen to date. The Italian Alps are amazing, full of lengthy tunnels and towering bridges, hugging the mountainside. We also follow a typical mountain river along the route. The road weaves around it giving us a great view of the relatively narrow stretch of water within a vast dry riverbed of jagged white rocks. Today it looks tame and otherworldly but when the melt water hits it, this must be transformed to a raging torrent.

It’s quite a shock when suddenly the landscape totally transforms almost instantly into a wide flat plain. This is Italy’s bread basket with fields full of crops ripening (or is that wilting) in the sun. Most of it seems to be maize (sweet corn). I’m not sure why and then I remember that staple of the Venetian diet, polenta. I’ve never really seen the attraction myself.

All through our trip our guide has kept up a fairly constant commentary. He is slowly driving Y out of her mind. She has started counting how many times he mentions the same place – seven seems to be the record.

We do have our own little bit of entertainment on board. A rather pretty language student had been sitting at the front, but was moved for the Romford sisters, who had booked it. So she moves back a few rows and finds a seat next to a rather attractive, if bearded, young man. We all keep surreptitiously glancing at them to see how they get on. She is apparently a Russian student and soon has someone to practice her English on. Ahhhh! Isn’t that sweet.

We stop for a break in a typical Italian service station where first you place you order and pay, taking your receipt to the counter to collect your food. Yes it does sound daft and Y is as incredulous as I was the first time. However I do manage a little Italian and get the drinks in. We sip these in the air conditioned shop area, impressed by the extensive range of literature on display. Not often you find classics and works by Freud in a British service station.

Back on the coach we have to pay a little extra for a boat to take us from the port at Venice to Piazza San Marco. Ordinarily I’d probably get a vaporetto, but today I just want to be molly coddled. Things must be going quite well with the student and her young man. He pays for her and then pays for them both to ride on a gondola. Well I think we now know he’s keen! Mind you it would be sad to go on a Gondola by yourself if there was a chance of a more attractive and romantic alternative. “Well he could take me then” Y quips! Sadly the girl does not seem overly impressed, except maybe by his gallantry. I don’t think I’ll be looking for a hat for the wedding just yet.

Well these are the sort of things that keep you going for five hours until we finally cross the long causeway over to the artificial island that forms Venice’s vast car park. Within moments of alighting we are being guided through the crowds to our waiting boat, and then on down the Canale della Giudecca for our first descent view of Venice proper, the Campanile, the Basilica San Marco and Doge’s Palace. Then we continue up the Molo for some while, leaving them all behind!

We wait just long enough, to find out where we are due to meet later and then vanish; particularly after the guide’s bit of confusion over where Casanova was imprisoned. At that point I knew I’d be a better guide even if we had left our book behind.

We slowly head back to the Piazza, stopping to look at the Bridge of Sighs. Venice is as crowded as ever and Y decides that she really can’t face the crowds and sun waiting to be pushed round the Basilica, so we head for the surrounding narrow streets instead.

I end up more or less making the circuit I did last year with another group of friends. We are soon lost in the maze of streets finally surfacing at the Rialto just when we think all is lost. We buy a wonderful cup of fruit salad from the market which does much to refresh us and slowly wander the San Polo district and its every quieter streets.

Desperate for a bit of respite from the heat we dive into the Church of San Polo. It proves my argument that you can go into any church in Venice and find great works of art. We find a very animated and dramatic depiction of the Last Supper by Tintoretto and tucked away in a side room, a fantastic collection of paintings by Tiepolo illustrating the Stations of the Cross. I don’t recall ever seeing a more tortured depiction of Christ. He’s been through the mill and you see all the pain and suffering etched on his face as he looks you dead in the eye.

A bit further on we come to another great church, the Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, or simply the Frari. Last year I had been really amazed by it and knew Y would love it. Particularly as it is far less crowded than it ought to be.

Well where do you start? First I point out the tiny painted sculpture of John the Baptist by Donatello. Then there is the Assumption of the Virgin by Titian. But my favourite painting is actually one I missed last time; Bellini’s Madonna Enthroned with Saints. It is tucked away in a side chapel, but it has amazing depth and power. The centre piece contains a painting of the Virgin and child in amazing 3D. In fact another visitor looks at it from both sides of the chapel just to check! When you can bring yourself to look at the figures on either side of the central panel you can see them illuminated by the light of the nearby, real, windows.

As wonderful as these paintings are, the obvious stars of the church are the enormous tombs that line the body of the building. Canova’s and Titian’s face each other with, in my mind, Canova’s winning hands down with its striking pyramid design.

Back outside we wind our way through the now far less crowded streets of Venice, towards the Academia Bridge. There is no hiding from the sun here so we only pause briefly to take a quick snap of Santa Maria della Salute, which sadly is still swathed in scaffolding. For a moment I’m tempted to suggest we head down there, but the heat is sapping all our energy and my already burnt back feels like it’s on fire. Our stroll around the town is becoming a frantic scurry between patches of shade.

Just beyond the Accademia we discover the Palazzo Pisani, now the Conservatory of Music. Adjacent to it is a small church, so unremarkable I can’t find it my excellent guidebook. However at the time we saw a cool interior and went inside. What a treat! The building is obviously now used for musical performances, but at the moment they are simply playing a recording of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. We take a seat, listen to the music and admire the obligatory artworks all around us. It is a wonderful oasis of calm in what has been a truly hectic day.

We have begun to suspect that the Conservatory of Music is staging a number of events to celebrate Vivaldi’s work. Less than five minutes away from our last stop is another tiny unknown building. Inside this is an exhibition of violins, with an exhibit showing how they are made. Unfortunately though we need to pick our way back towards Piazza San Marco as our time is fast running out and there is no way I’m going to rush about in this heat.

Why is it that those ever so useful ‘per San Marco’ signs (and all the other ones to different parts of town) always seem to fizzle out when you least suspect it? We end up taking a few blind alleys before I finally spot a glimpse of San Marco between some columns. Still that is what Venice is about; getting lost and making new and wonderful discoveries.

Of course Venice can also be about fashion, glamour and shopping, which is how we end our day. Well, maybe that should be how I persuade Y to end her day. She did start by looking for presents for her children and mother, but I soon talked her into buying a rather beautiful Murano Glass chicken (she’s rather fond of chickens).

She’s still trying to shop as we walk down the quay towards our boat. There are tens of little market stalls along the route, selling the same sort of tat on each. A spaghetti bib or apron would be her preferred choice of gift for her student son, but not if it means being ripped off. I think she must have asked every stallholder for a price and I can exclusively reveal that the going price seems to be €8. But at the furthest end of the quay this did fall to a staggering €7! Personally I thought she should have gone for the apron with a digitally enhanced version of Michelangelo’s David.

We wait for a few minutes in the shade of a nearby building for our group to assemble. Only at the last minute, when our boat docks, do we venture back out into the sun. We are shattered, hot and dead on our feet. I’m actually really glad we aren’t travelling by vaporetto and can spread ourselves around on board the boat. At the port we are led back to the coach and meekly climb aboard, conscious that we now have another five hour coach trip ahead of us. But we do get a brief half hour break in another Italian service station. However this one has a more familiar self service counter.

It never ceases to amaze me how every other nation in Europe seems to serve fantastic food in motorway service stations; except, of course, the British! I pile my plate with a mix of rice and pasta salads accompanied by roasted Mediterranean vegetables and it wonderful. In fact I could eat it all over again! In the end though, we just have a couple of puddings to make up for missing our daily visit to the Bear.

The only significant thing about the coach trip home is the dramatic change in the weather. We drive towards a dark, ominous sky and by the time we finally reach the mountains, we’ve had thunder and lightening and the rain has begun. It stays will us all the way across the remainder of Italy and Slovenia to our final destination.

We can’t help but notice that true love has not exactly blossomed for the young couple who met earlier this morning. When she isn’t napping the Russian student is reading and taking notes. The young man looks slightly keener and we wait with baited breath for him to make his move. He does this as we are driving into Bled, just before he has to get off the coach. Tentatively he wonders if she would like to meet up for coffee, but she doesn’t seem to leap at the chance. As he walks away he glances back over his shoulder and waves half heartedly, but she is already engrossed again in her work. Still, he’ll always have Venice. Good grief! That’s what sitting on a coach for ten hours does to me.

Boy, are we glad to be back and even gladder that we don’t have to get up early tomorrow morning. However as I dawdle back to the hotel, relishing the cooling rain on my face, I realise that the three hour drive tomorrow’s going to feel like a walk in the park by comparison.