Welcome back to “When Wine Calls” this time we are back in Northern Italy in the romantic city of Venice.
Arriving in Venice proved to be more difficult than we had envisaged. The plan was that we would arrive on the ferry from Rovinj into the main port area and then catch a local Vaporetto (ferry) around to our hotel located on the Grand Canal. The outcome was very different as we arrived at a different ferry wharf and discovered that the water bus we required did not depart from any terminals in that vicinity.
We looked on our map and found that the hotel was quite close, so we made the fateful decision to walk to it, forgetting two important considerations, firstly that it was in the mid 30 degrees in Venice on the day and secondly, that we needed to go over several canal bridges along the route that all had many steps to negotiate with our luggage.
When we finally arrived at our hotel, we walked into reception looking like we had just run a marathon with sweat pouring down our faces and our clothing drenched. We hardly looked like guests who should be staying at this magnificent grand Venetian hotel and that was reflective of the look the concierge gave us.
We, of course, explained where we had travelled from and after a short while he understood our English and simply said “your room is ready, you may wish to go upstairs and freshen up, then come back down and I will give you details on the hotel”. We just laughed to ourselves and followed the porter to our room. Welcome to Venice.
As I mentioned in my last blog we had not been to Venice since the mid 80’s and even then, we only got to see the main tourist spots. While we wanted to revisit these again during our stay, we also wanted to take time to stroll around the canals, enjoy the city away from the crowds and discover unusual activities as we stumbled upon them.
We had booked a hotel, Hotel Palazzo Stern located on the Grand Canal just up from the Accademia Bridge, one of two bridges that cross the Grand Canal, the other being the famous Rialto Bridge. It was on the quieter side of the Grand Canal and well located to all themain city highlights.
The hotel had an amazing terrace right on the canal front that was just wonderful for enjoying breakfast each morning, dinners and our nightly aperitif watching all the canal traffic, including the famous gondolas and Venetian power boats pass by. The boutique hotel was first built in the XV century, partially destroyed by fire, and finished off in the XX century as a Venetian palace after it was bought by the Stern family.
The interior was decorated in the grand Venetian style with all ornate furniture and fittings throughout – a true ongoing reflection of ancient Venetian architecture.
We only had a few days to explore Venice so after receiving a map of the city and information from the concierge we immediately went out exploring and early on came across an old, converted church that had a sign outside highlighting a Concerto was performing during the week. Impulsively, we went in and discovered that the Concerto was a 7-piece string group that were playing Vivaldi that night and some tickets were still available so we booked them.
We then proceeded on a circular route around the city that took in all the main highlights including the Academia Bridge, St Mark’s Square and Basilica, Doge’s Palace, St Mark’s Campanile, Bridge of Sighs,
Rialto Bridge, the famous Salizada San Moise shopping street in the San Marco district strip and of course, view all the gondolas on the canals.
What we noticed was that due to the heat ( I think we were in Europe’s 4th heatwave for the summer) the crowds were down and so we could walk around without too much difficulty except for around the Rialto Bridge and the high end shops where the crowds had flocked to.
As we approached our hotel, we found a local bar with tables set up in a piazza, so it was Aperol time after our long walk, then it was back to our hotel for some time in the air conditioning after well and truly hitting our step count for the day. We ended up going to the piazza every afternoon while we were in Venice as Aperol’s there were a bargain.
For dinner that night we strolled down a little laneway near the hotel and stumbled along this quaint little restaurant with a handwritten menu in the window. The food turned out to be wonderful and we remarked that like other towns we had visited on this trip we had uncovered a real gem just by walking around rather than searching online.
When we arrived for the Concerto we walked into this magnificent converted church with all old violins in glass cases around the walls dating back to the 1600’s and an unbelievable grand piano centre stage to support the string performers.
It turned out to be a fantastic impromptu evening in the heart of Venice and we slowly walked back to our hotel along the canals and reflected on what a beautiful city it is at night.
We finished the evening on the terrace of our hotel having an aperitif and soaking up the surreal atmosphere. The next day was another exploring day and I mentioned to Pauline over breakfast that I would like to visit the famous Teatro La Fenice Performance Arts Theatre. On arrival we found that they had self-guided tours of the building, but we could not visit the stage floor, only the upper floors as a full-dress rehearsal of La Traviatta was in progress. When we arrived at the second floor, to our surprise we were able to stand in one of the private boxes as well as the larger Royal Box overlooking the stage and watch the magnificent production as if we were there on the night – a real unexpected thrill although unfortunately, we were unable to take any pictures of of the stage or the perfrmance.
Dinner that night was at a romantic lamp-light table outside on the terrace of our hotel overlooking the Grand Canal – you couldn’t have found a better location and we ended the evening with the terrace to ourselves to soak up the overall charm that Venice offers.
When we had arrived at the hotel the Concierge had mentioned that we could take a private water taxi out to Murano Island and visit one of the famous Murano Glass Factories there and they would cover the cost of the transport out there and we could catch a ferry back to the hotel when we had finished. The opportunity to travel on one of the beautiful Venetian power boats down the Grand Canal direct from our hotel wharf and across to the island was too good to pass up and while we couldn’t purchase any glassware due to our ongoing travels, we thoroughly enjoyed seeing the glassmaking and walking around the quaint island.
We decided to come back to Venice using the Vaporetto which bought us directly back to St Mark’s Square with a magnificent water view of the Square, Doge’s Place and the Bridge of Sighs on approach to the terminal.
For dinner on our last night, we again walked down one of the laneways and came across this quirky traditional Italian restaurant. While we were reading the menu in the window this elderly Italian guy came out and stated that he had worked as a chef in London previously (must have been some time ago we thought) and that he would cook any variation of the menu that we wanted. He was so unbelievable we just had to go in and have dinner there and it proved again to be a very funny experience.
Every time we suggested a course he would say “yes you can have “that” but I think you should have “this” that wasn’t even on the menu so in the end we weren’t really sure what we had ordered until it arrived. Each time he would come to the table he would continually say ”prego, prego” (in English “Please”) so that at the end of the evening all we could say on the way home was “prego, prego prego” to ourselves and break out in laughter – a very funny evening and while we couldn’t call the food the most outstanding we have had on this trip it certainly was original with heaps of atmosphere thrown in.
Once again on this trip, our short visit to Venice was over too soon and we needed to head the next morning to the train station for our train to Verona. However, after the fun we had on our arrival this time I organised a private water taxi to pick us up from our hotel and we were at the train station in only 15 minutes – a much better outcome than previously and we had a fantastic final view of Venice along the way – it is no doubt a truly remarkable and memorable city.
We will catch you again soon as we explore Verona, a city we know very little about except that we were heading there for Pauline to visit one of her bucket list items, the famous Juliet’s Balcony.
Goodbye from fabulous Venice.
Bruce and Pauline
When Wine Calls 
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