Venice, the city that is a museum.

Saturday, our last full day in Venice.  We intended to explore San Croce and Cannaregio (ghetto vechio and nuovo) leaving the rest of San Polo for the following morning.  We grabbed our map and walked into the cold sunshine eager to begin an epic walk around Venice.  Our first stop was at an ATM which come to think of it, was the only ATM I had seen in the entire city.  The budget was blown and we needed additional cash. 

The wonderful thing about Venice is that there are no end of beautiful buildings, canal views and crooked streets to distract you as you wander.  The entire city is one big museum and we stopped at churches and art schools and government buildings at square after square.

After spending most of the morning in San Croce we crossed the Grand Canal into Cannaregio and immediately the flavor changed.  Here there were sidewalk food vendors and souvenir stalls and crowds of people all heading toward the neighboring San Marcos barrio. 

Moving deeper into the neighborhood it became much quieter very quickly as the streets narrowed into alleys and we moved from sun into shade.

We were looking for the old Jewish quarter and wanted to see some of the historical schools and the synagogue. 

The lack of people on the streets seemed a little eerie until we realized that it was Saturday.  Great planning huh?

No problem.  We’ll just explore the rest of this neighborhood and some more of San Marcos.  The walk through Cannaregio to San Marcos was as interesting as it was complicated.  We were trying to avoid the crowded Rialto shopping district (Mercerie) but all roads seemed to lead us there.  As we tried to find another historical building we came out of a tunnel, crossed a canal, took a 90 degree turn to the left and found ourselves in a beautiful little plaza next to a picturesque canal.

We were hungry and thirsty so we stopped at a sidewalk café on the square, went inside because it was quite chilly and had a very reasonably priced lunch with the appropriate adult beverages.  Italian food served by Chinese proprietors; a good combination for Venice in my book.  A little more wandering and we decided to return to the hotel for a nap.

Feeling lazy that evening we returned for pizza and beer at what was becoming our favorite little bar in San Polo.  The prices were steep but hey, you got quality food and drink and, they were very, very close to our hotel.  The owner of the hotel had told us that he had a bar nearby and we wandered the dark Venetian streets looking for it but had no success.  Maybe next time.

Sunday, our final morning in Venice.  We rose late, had a leisurely light breakfast, and headed toward the fish market. 

This is a very interesting place if you are looking to buy fish, eel, crabs and other crawly things which we weren’t.

Alongside the market were vegetable vendors and bread vendors weren’t far away.  There was an outdoor market as well where you could find clothes of all types and of course, souvenirs.

We wandered completely around the San Polo neighborhood stopping for coffee at our favorite place on the Grand Canal and turning only when we found dead ends or canals without crossings.  Around noon, knowing that our taxi would pick us up around 2 to take us to the ship we found ourselves once again at our favorite little bar and decided for one more piece of that delectable pizza. 

Everybody waived goodbye to us as we left to pack our bags.  We checked out after confirming that our taxi would meet us on the nearby pier and began wrestling our heavy bags down the stairs and outside.  We pulled them to the pier just in time to see the taxi pull up.  With the bags in we settled in for the 15 minute, 80 euro ride to the pier where our ship awaited us.  We were really looking forward to 3 weeks of great food and relaxation on our Italian cruise ship.