Around The World Without Flying: Venice Part 1 - the Grand Canal and St Mark's Square in the evening

I am making time to catch up as much as I can on my blogs, as I am not certain how WiFi will go on the ship, after my last experience.

After Verona, we drove down to Venice, and spent our first night cruising along the Grand Canal to the very popular and very beautiful St Mark’s Square, exploring the square and then returning to our hotel on the Grand Canal. What memorable experiences!

As we approached this famous city, I had not realised there are two Venices, as it were. There is the fairly industrial city on the mainland, then the water city, which is an island shaped rather like a fish and known as Venezia. After obtaining the compulsory permission to drive across the main bridge linking the two, our coach had to leave us on a dock and we had to travel the rest of the way on a launch. Even then we had to hike to our hotel, carrying most of our baggage. Having travelled all day, we were tired but we were so just so excited to have our first glimpse of this water town we barely noticed. And soon we were to travel along the Grand Canal on a small fleet of small motor boats.

Most of us had heard that at one stage not long ago, Venezia was flooded. As we headed along the canal in our boats, we could see some marks on buildings where the floods had reached, and found out that even St Mark’s Square was under water at that time. But we were surprised to learn that Venezia is a complex city with hundreds of canals, bridges and narrow streets.

The buildings along the canal were very stately, historic buildings - just lovely to see.

When we arrived at St Mark’s Square, we were just so impressed with its size and the grandeur of all the buildings that surround it, especially St Mark’s Cathedral. The sun was setting, and it just looked stunning as all the lights came on. If that sight was not enough of a treat in itself, our tour director took us for a drink at the famous 'Florian', the first ever coffee shop, which is situated in the square. It was just wonderful to sit there in total luxury with their superb service and have a very decadent hot chocolate and nibbles. (Most of the others drank special cocktails.)

Returning along the canal to our hotel was also a wonderful experience, with it all lit up, some restaurants providing lovely coloured reflections in the water. All I can say is - Wow! I will let all my best photos speak for themselves. But remember this blog site uploads them in a strange order, because some were taken with my phone camera and the rest with my ordinary camera. The night photos were all taken with my phone.