This year we are fortunate to be returning to Lucerne for two concerts at the Lucerne Festival, and to be starting our trip in Venice (not a bad place for dear spouse's birthday!) with a short stop in the Val Gardena planned before ending in Lucerne.
Venice is not far from Parma where we were last summer, but very different in feeling. Parma was food heaven, small, uncrowded with much of the town away on ferie (vacation), and very local feeling. Here on the island city known as "the most serene" (La Serenissima) there are no cars in the heart of town, but huge masses of humanity. At least, in summer at mid-day the masses descend... sometimes, literally descending from huge cruise ships which seem to tower over the fragile, crumbling city which holds together with renovations, restoration of crumbling brick, and an evident pride in its history. The crowds seem to gravitate especially to Piazza San Marco (St. Mark's Square), Ponte Rialto (the Rialto Bridge) and the main ways connecting the two. Those who live here have learned to dodge the baby carriages, picture-takers and map-starers stopping on and clogging the narrow bridges and calli.
St. Mark's is fabulous and it's a bit humbling to see and enter the basilica with all of its history. I know little of art or religious history but can imagine the great composer Claudio Monteverdi, who was choir master here at the end of the renaissance period in music, experimenting with chorus groups in the different high lofts, having them respond and imitate back and forth instead of try to sing together through all the reverberation amongst the stone and high ceilings, helping to develop the antiphonal style which ultimately found further expression in the concerto and the Baroque. When I took a little music, his Orfeo was considered by many to be the first "opera" in the modern sense, in history.
Then there are the pigeons. The many -- thousands upon thousands -- of tourists taking pictures and loudly conversing, some on the phone, inside the basilica and the Doge's Palace, despite the signage imploring them not to take photos or make phone calls. The vendors of tacky t-shirts just outside the Doge's Palace. It seemed important to see this place, and equally important not to conclude this is all there is to Venice.
Venice itself is a bit of a museum and depends on tourism for much of its economy. Yet many tourists only see St. Mark's and Rialto during the day and clearly spend very little here. Parma seemed like a real Italian town if perhaps on the wealthy side, far less touristed. Venice seems both chameleon and ancient museum personified.
We were exhausted after 9 hours Seattle to Amsterdam (most of the way treated to a combination of a crying, exhausted little boy and a young girl perhaps 3 of 4 who had behavioral challenges and threw repeated, loud and eventually very unsympathetic tantrums. There was no sleep on this flight, easily the worst (for noise, luckily the flight was on time and otherwise without incident) on which I've been in my limited experience. The hop from Amsterdam to Venice was a comparative joy and Venice airport compact and easy to navigate.
Our hotel (Hotel al Codega) is centrally located between San Marco and Rialto, but very hard to find initially and set on a relatively secluded square (Forno Vecchio, approximately the "old oven" as I understand it, and presumably there was once a bakery of some sort here?) It is peaceful, pretty and quiet where not many yards away, the passageways are jammed with tourists, smokers, teenagers making out, tourists dragging luggage, etc.
The day of our arrival we had a simple but very good dinner at a local trattoria -- prosciutto e melone for old times' sake (but no culatello, our favorite, found yet!), a salad with octopus for dear spouse and a simply prepared branzino (sea bass) with tomatoes and capers for me.
Our first full day we were tired but spent the morning on a guided tour with Luisella, a fantastic private tour guide who is well educated both locally and for some graduate education in the U.S., very passionate about her Venice (born on Giudecca), funny, engaging, absolutely wonderful in every way. We wish she could introduce us to every new place we visit! We saw the old merchant area in San Polo (markets, locations of the old banks and gold merchants which now have tacky booths with cheap tourist goods erected in front of them every day), the historic red light district, and the Frari (Franciscan) church which was heavily funded by the Pesaro family during the long period of its construction. Monteverdi is buried here though he worked at San Marco. The church is full of fantastic woodwork and art in situ, including a famous Titian painting of the assumption of Mary that is a whirl of arms and legs and energy, with prominent reds, framed in a way to suggest the space in which it located, suggesting that the life and emotions in this very "alive" painting could jump out of the picture and into the very space in front of it. This piece was amazing even to an art dummy like me.
We took a short water taxi tour with Luisella, a great way to see some of the churches, historically ethnic residential areas, contrasting architecture, etc. in Venice that would take hours and days to see on foot. Cichetti (varied bite-sized offerings, like fried zucchini flowers, polpette (meatballs) of seafood, tiny sandwiches, etc.) for lunch at Antica Dolo was a wonderful meal, and affordable as Venice goes.
We also had a wonderful dinner for L's birthday at Bistrot de Venise, featuring historical Venetian recipes from centuries ago, simple but good food. A very nice time seated outside in the warm Venetian air.
Our second full day we visited Murano and Burano. More to come sometime when there is time to download pictures and write... there has been very little down time for us. A few pics from the first couple days posted here. Venice -- La Serenissima -- e molto bella. It is also crushed by hoards of tourists, and I guess we are contributing to that, so it's hard to complain.
Venice is not far from Parma where we were last summer, but very different in feeling. Parma was food heaven, small, uncrowded with much of the town away on ferie (vacation), and very local feeling. Here on the island city known as "the most serene" (La Serenissima) there are no cars in the heart of town, but huge masses of humanity. At least, in summer at mid-day the masses descend... sometimes, literally descending from huge cruise ships which seem to tower over the fragile, crumbling city which holds together with renovations, restoration of crumbling brick, and an evident pride in its history. The crowds seem to gravitate especially to Piazza San Marco (St. Mark's Square), Ponte Rialto (the Rialto Bridge) and the main ways connecting the two. Those who live here have learned to dodge the baby carriages, picture-takers and map-starers stopping on and clogging the narrow bridges and calli.
St. Mark's is fabulous and it's a bit humbling to see and enter the basilica with all of its history. I know little of art or religious history but can imagine the great composer Claudio Monteverdi, who was choir master here at the end of the renaissance period in music, experimenting with chorus groups in the different high lofts, having them respond and imitate back and forth instead of try to sing together through all the reverberation amongst the stone and high ceilings, helping to develop the antiphonal style which ultimately found further expression in the concerto and the Baroque. When I took a little music, his Orfeo was considered by many to be the first "opera" in the modern sense, in history.
Then there are the pigeons. The many -- thousands upon thousands -- of tourists taking pictures and loudly conversing, some on the phone, inside the basilica and the Doge's Palace, despite the signage imploring them not to take photos or make phone calls. The vendors of tacky t-shirts just outside the Doge's Palace. It seemed important to see this place, and equally important not to conclude this is all there is to Venice.
Venice itself is a bit of a museum and depends on tourism for much of its economy. Yet many tourists only see St. Mark's and Rialto during the day and clearly spend very little here. Parma seemed like a real Italian town if perhaps on the wealthy side, far less touristed. Venice seems both chameleon and ancient museum personified.
We were exhausted after 9 hours Seattle to Amsterdam (most of the way treated to a combination of a crying, exhausted little boy and a young girl perhaps 3 of 4 who had behavioral challenges and threw repeated, loud and eventually very unsympathetic tantrums. There was no sleep on this flight, easily the worst (for noise, luckily the flight was on time and otherwise without incident) on which I've been in my limited experience. The hop from Amsterdam to Venice was a comparative joy and Venice airport compact and easy to navigate.
Our hotel (Hotel al Codega) is centrally located between San Marco and Rialto, but very hard to find initially and set on a relatively secluded square (Forno Vecchio, approximately the "old oven" as I understand it, and presumably there was once a bakery of some sort here?) It is peaceful, pretty and quiet where not many yards away, the passageways are jammed with tourists, smokers, teenagers making out, tourists dragging luggage, etc.
The day of our arrival we had a simple but very good dinner at a local trattoria -- prosciutto e melone for old times' sake (but no culatello, our favorite, found yet!), a salad with octopus for dear spouse and a simply prepared branzino (sea bass) with tomatoes and capers for me.
Our first full day we were tired but spent the morning on a guided tour with Luisella, a fantastic private tour guide who is well educated both locally and for some graduate education in the U.S., very passionate about her Venice (born on Giudecca), funny, engaging, absolutely wonderful in every way. We wish she could introduce us to every new place we visit! We saw the old merchant area in San Polo (markets, locations of the old banks and gold merchants which now have tacky booths with cheap tourist goods erected in front of them every day), the historic red light district, and the Frari (Franciscan) church which was heavily funded by the Pesaro family during the long period of its construction. Monteverdi is buried here though he worked at San Marco. The church is full of fantastic woodwork and art in situ, including a famous Titian painting of the assumption of Mary that is a whirl of arms and legs and energy, with prominent reds, framed in a way to suggest the space in which it located, suggesting that the life and emotions in this very "alive" painting could jump out of the picture and into the very space in front of it. This piece was amazing even to an art dummy like me.
We took a short water taxi tour with Luisella, a great way to see some of the churches, historically ethnic residential areas, contrasting architecture, etc. in Venice that would take hours and days to see on foot. Cichetti (varied bite-sized offerings, like fried zucchini flowers, polpette (meatballs) of seafood, tiny sandwiches, etc.) for lunch at Antica Dolo was a wonderful meal, and affordable as Venice goes.
We also had a wonderful dinner for L's birthday at Bistrot de Venise, featuring historical Venetian recipes from centuries ago, simple but good food. A very nice time seated outside in the warm Venetian air.
Our second full day we visited Murano and Burano. More to come sometime when there is time to download pictures and write... there has been very little down time for us. A few pics from the first couple days posted here. Venice -- La Serenissima -- e molto bella. It is also crushed by hoards of tourists, and I guess we are contributing to that, so it's hard to complain.
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