Day 8 - Churches, Churches everywhere ... oooh a Gondola!

 

We set off bright and early (how unusual for us!) from Assisi this morning. We waved goodbye to the beautiful rose coloured city, sitting half way up the mountain, and set out towards our first stop, Classe. We travelled through beautiful Umbria countryside, and then through the Appenine mountains to the Paduan plateaus. More stunning countryside!!!! We arrived in Classe and visited the church of St Appollinaris. We had a quick look around this nice, Romanesque church. It was beautiful, with large marble pillars holding up the roof, all hand carved! Chris advised us to run our hands around the pillars (which we did) as you can still feel the lines of carving in the marble. This church was  ‘plain’ compared to any of the others we have visited, however it was still stunning! The nave of the church was surrounded by sarcophagi's of past popes, however they are now empty as the bodies were all taken back to Rome. We then had a gelato to cool off from the warm Italian sun. It was yummo! Delicious pistachio and lemon, yum, yum!

 

From here we travelled further north to Pomposa to visit another church and to have a padina (local flat bread) with tomatoes, prosciutto and local mozzarella. We then looked around some of the small shops and I bought a tea towel (yes it’s touristy but meh, one thing!). It was then back on the bus to continue our journey up to Venice. We went across the lagoon bridge. It was enormous! Water, water all around.... but I  wouldn't drink it! We could see a lot of the fishing boats still out on the lagoon catching seafood for dinner that night, or for tomorrow! Unfortunately, when you drove past the lagoon you couldn’t help but notice the pollution in the water, and the dirty colour. It was kind of sad. After crossing the lagoon, we stopped just before the grand canal and disembarked our Trafalgar bus and boarded 6 water taxis which took us up the grand canal.

 

With Trafalgar radios and headsets in hand, and Chris (travel director) in the middle boat, we toured up the Grad canal, like a great boat convoy. It was a fantastic sight to see (and to be a part of!). The buildings of Venice were beautiful, all sitting right on the water’s edge in light colours. It was amazing! We past by many of the beautiful museums and the palazzos. We arrived just outside of Saint Marco’s square. Chris walked us through some side streets so that we could enter the square with the best view of St. Marco’s basilica. It was breath taking! The beautiful old basilica at one end of a large piazza, surrounded by large arches with high end jewellery, clothes, glass and mask shops under them. There were also a few cafes on the square, where there were cream canvas umbrellas and a small quartet playing. The musicians were at the “musicians café”, a café favourite throughout time by famous musicians. We walked through the square and out the back to where 9 gondolas were waiting for our group. We all boarded them in fours and sixes and with two sets of musicians we travelled through some of the small canals of venice, and then out into the grand canal, and back. We spent the next 30 minutes just sitting back and listening to the closest musicians serenade us with famous Italian songs, while the tourists took photos of our group as we travelled through Venice champagne in one hand and camera in the other.

After our gondola ride, we moved back through St. Marco’s square (over four bridges- which was reinforced by Chris as the tomorrow we need to meet at the boat after our free time) to where our taxi was waiting to take us to the Lido, a long island of Venice that sits between Venice and the Adriatic sea. This island is fantastic, as it allows cars and buses to drive onto it (they have to get a ferry, which is what Michele our driver did while we were relaxing on the gondolas- he even unpacked our bags from the bus!). It has a supermarket on the island (theirs is only one in Venice proper, but you need to get there by boat making it difficult to really shop. However on the Lido there is a large supermarket and many, many shops. It is kind of like Burley heads in QLD, with lots of shops and a beachy feel. We went to our hotel, where our bags had already been put in our rooms, and freshened up for the included dinner at the hotel restaurant. The dinner was delicious, with a panacotta dessert! Yum!

Chris informed us that we would be out early tomorrow to catch the boat to the Glass blowing factory for our glass blowing demonstration, so it was early to bed for me! Night!