venturing on to Venice

So we met up with our friend Aase and a friend of hers- in Venice for a few days.  We both had been planning to visit and so coordinated travel plans to be there at the same time!

we would be in Venice on Phil's 60th birthday and Aase (who had been present at a number of birthday celebrations over the years) would be there to help celebrate with us!

we arrived by train from Trieste (a slower regional train with limited stops but not the high speed one we would later take to Bologna from Venice) as we exited the station we found some changes since the previous trips (four for me and I think roughly the same for Phil, but twice before together) there are now machines to buy vaporetto tickets! and some things have not changed - crowds everywhere around the train station and the Rialto and San Marco...

we got on a "bus" as the vaporetti truly are - just on the water- still a bus... with our bags and made our way to the San Marco stop and hiked from there to the hotel... of course our room was not ready despite it being past noon... so we went to eat at the place where I had my first meal in Venice roughly two decades ago-  I don't have photos of the place from this trip, other than a sign recognizing that the restaurant is exactly our age!

we had a main course each and then desserts - decent food in a city not known for its food at all...
then back to the hotel where our room is now ready - we check in and explore the hotel a bit...

the view from our room-

our dinner is at the top (according to some guides) in Venice, Da Fiore and it is kind of a hike - we have encountered a bit of rain today and we expect it to be raining this evening so we leave plenty of time. The distance is not great but the 27 (yes 27) twists and turns in Venice's narrow streets make it a bit complex- the white dots are places where you turn and the blue ones are bridges to cross-

conveniently marked on the map are the other two dinner places we have reserved while there - Da Ivo  and Ai Mercanti (old favorites and more on those later) but as you can see they are much closer- and located between our hotel and Aase's hotel.

dinner started with an amuse of polenta and fried whitebait- then I had the baccalao and Phil mixed carpaccio and then for mains I had the tagliatelle with white truffles (LOL I know- I know) and Phil had mixed seafood plate followed by a dessert (of which I couldn't even try a spoonful I was so full)

but back to Venice- perhaps I should have left well enough alone- it was less magical this time, more overrun with badly behaving tourists even at night  and even in the priciest restaurants... and this may end up being my last trip there (remains to be seen.)  The age of the selfie has fully arrived in Venice and the Africans who used to sell knock-off Louis Vuitton bags along the streets leading into San Marco now also hawk a device that is like a "go go gadget arm" to take selfies from a greater distance so as to get it all in the photo.  This is not a great thing. Has the world become so self centered? Must everyone be the star everywhere all the time? I gather from the latest visit to Venice the answer is a resounding YES... but I digress

we took the outer route on the way to San Marco so we passed the dock for the giant cruise ships that disgorge thousands of passengers into the timeless streets of Venice each day by 10AM.  They follow the leader with a flag with their group number upon it... 20-25 in a pack... again I digress but I keep hearing Brando's Colonel Kurtz in my head "the horror, the horror"....

along the way to San Marco that first day - we also saw a new abomination (from an architectural standpoint) bridges that have been covered over with long ramps and metal pipe railings along the waterfront, a good thing for a wheel chair but an eye sore none-the-less... yes, two decades have certainly brought changes to the atmosphere of Venice... and yet - underneath the most recent annoyances - the city lies as it always has waiting for the cruise ship crowds to leave, a quiet to descend and to bring out its mystery... for that it still has. I always need to remind myself that Venice may be the world's oldest amusement park (the pyramids the world's oldest tourist attraction perhaps, but Venice definitely an amusement park) People have come here for centuries and those who came earlier bemoaned the changes and the degradation of the experience they once had "way back when".

Yet still, it beguiles: here are just a few photos to get you started - more in later posts- these were taken on the way to the hotel on day one-

 

so more later as I sort out the photos of our brief visit- but I will give you one of my favorites - from my phone photos at breakfast the following morning- my view to Santa Maria della Salute-

not a bad way to linger over the morning cappuccino.... stay tuned

split splendors

We arrived in Split mid afternoon

Split is a beautiful city that has grown even more lovely since my last visit in 2005.  the waterfront "Riva" has been remade into a grand promenade pedestrian area lined with open air cafes where locals while away their time drinking endless thimbles of espresso....we kept wondering whether they ever work?  the guide said "not much this time of year" many make livings in tourism and when the season ends they take it easy.

since the weather was glorious the whole time we spent on the Dalmatian Coast- in the low to mid 60s and sunny- we did our best to join them as frequently as we could.

Split is a city built around the Diocletian Palace of Roman times.  the former emperor built his retirement villa here as things were waning for him in politics of Rome.  The whole of his HUGE palace has now become incorporated in the most delightful way into the old town of the living city.  a map shows the old city and the yellow outlines the footprint of the palace... the two roads of every Roman city cutting through the heart of this palace as well- the Cardo and the Decumanus.

in this beautiful rotunda- we heard the guys below singing acapella - it was magnificent- they were fabulous!

the stones and walls and temples are incorporated into current structures including the cathedral.

Diocletian was NOT a good guy- he killed virtually all of his family for become christian so there is some small irony in the fact that his tomb has been turned into a little gem of a church in the center of the town/palace.

we had time upon arrival to get an orientation and made plans to eat locally for lunch and dinner with some folks we met from SFO who were on the ship but in the other group of 25 (the ship held 50 max and it was at capacity on this first voyage of its winter itinerary - while the weather still holds)

we spent our time in the market, had a local pizza, explored a bit in the Venetian era "middle city" and visited the synagogue.

the town has some fairly artistic graffiti - as opposed to gang names scrawled on every building as we saw in Zagreb- here there seems to be a bit more thought put into the statements made- although mostly we couldn't figure out the message - must have been lost in the translation - LOL

 as I walked back to the ship- leaving Phil at the Internet cafe... I came across this great shot of three colors of tug boats- (black red and green)

and on our way to the hole in the wall (down an alley and into a basement) Kod Joze restaurant, we used this statue by Ivan Mestrovic as our landmark - it is of one of the bishops that Diocletian killed in his rampage against Christianity.

the food was excellent but the portions were enormous.  we had some fabulous mussels and risotto and one of us had pasta and another had the wild boar-- altogether the four of us had food that could have easily fed eight... but the waiter didn't tell us until after the meal - LOL- when he said "next time you order 1 for 2"  by then he had made his sale- LOL

our next destination is Sibenik where we will see the town and then go out into the countryside to visit a park with a well known waterfall.