Venice, Italy
(continued)
We started the day with breakfast on the patio again. Today we had lots of gondoliers singing. It was very sunny and warm without a umbrella.
We headed up town for a little shopping. MrsWT73 wanted to take a look inside H&M. I’d always wanted to do a gondola ride in Venice so we set out to explore options. We tried to get a gondola ride by the post near the hotel, but they were lined up about 30 deep, then off for lunch until 2 PM.
Taking stock of the situation, we meandered back over the Rialto Bridge to Al Mecra, a counter based wine and chichetti bar that served over 30 wines by the glass. A quick fill up on prosciutto and a few glasses of Pinot Grigio.
After a fill, we meandered over calle gondolieri and queued up for a gondola ride. The rides are still posted at a flat rate of 80€ for 30 minutes. I didn’t try one on my last visit in another life and had always regretted it. Despite being a bit on the expensive side, I wasn’t going to miss it this time around.
Our gondolier had a strong likeness to Popeye. We got our gondola and had a leisurely ride up through the canal area, eventually making it to the Grand Canale. It was neat to see the quiet side of Venice’s historic canals where people have come and gone for years. The canals are completely quiet compared to the throngs of tourists that wander the walkways and corridors of the San Marco district of Venice.
The ride itself was peaceful, and completely quiet except for the water rowing noises at times. At other times, it was busier and louder as you heard the sounds of Venice all around you.
Our route took us up to the Grand Canale just south of the Rialto bridge. As always, the canal was a hive of activity and felt like one of the busiest waterways in the world. It felt like we were returning to one of the busy highway waterways of the world. A busy highway that was exceptionally posh.
The views on the Grande Canale from the water were truly impressive. It was much nicer to take in the sights from a slow moving gondola than the smelly and fumy vaporetto.
Out gondolier took us past the Aman Hotel where George and Amal Clooney got married. He was pretty excited that I knew about the existence of the property.
The route took us back towards the canal area and back into quiet again. Our gondolier driver had a quick cigarette vape while we were on the grand canal – something I noticed a lot of the other gondolier drivers doing at one point or another. I would have thought that these guys would have been the athletic non smoker types having to huff and puff a boat around all day but I guess not. This isn’t a criticism but more of a personal observation.
There was a small pile up as they queued us to disembark all the gondoliers on this circular route.
The 80€ fee (plus tips) is steep but of all the tourist attractions, tickets, entrance fees I have spent on, a gondola ride is one of the most memorable things that I’ve always wanted to do since I could remember. The experience of gliding along on a gondola, through quiet and busy, underneath bridges while people snap photographs of you from the busy calles above. It was truly a clichéd but magical experience.
We headed though San Marco’s square in our last hours of our stay in Venice. It was another beautiful fall day.
We thoroughly enjoyed our visit to Venice. It’s probably among the more expensive destinations that I’ve had the experience to visit, but at the same time its completely unique in almost every way. I was happy we got the experience for the gondola ride. The Westin Europa Venice was pretty good to us overall. A last closing view from the Ponte Accademia Bridge today before we left the city.
