Glad you got the postcard.

I almost left your postcard in the shopping cart at the Billa Supermarket on the Zattere. The post office is next door so I had the postcard with me when I went to buy bread, cheese, and wine.

I am way too tired to write a report, but we loved Venice despite all the tourists from the "floating cities" cruise ships.

Some of the ships parked in Venice had to have had 10K people on board. Not good when you are trying to walk and these people are shoving you to get past so they can grab their t-shirts and glass figurines for "Aunt Paula in Clevland."

Don't bother to see the Tintorettos at the Scuola of St. Rocco, just get your lousy Louis Vuitton knock-off from that African man in Campo San Stefano.

That was the worst of Venice, but there were many many good and beautiful things.

Will post later on what we did, ate, saw.

Tired Thin

I guess that we were lucky to be in Venice when there were no cruise ships (that I was aware of, anyway).

The same was not the case in 2009, when I was in Dürnstein, Austria. The boats were small, but then so is Dürnstein.

Thin, are you in Venice now? We heard there was a tornado that passed over the lagoon and some islands yesterday. Did you see it?

Hey Thin,

>Some of the ships parked in Venice had to have had 10K people on board.<

Oh, don't exaggerate. None of them have more than 5500 passengers.

Looking forward to your report.

Get away from San Marco. The majority of the calle and bridges are as quiet as tombs. Santa Croce is away from the tourist hordes and has some lovely restaurants, views, and local color.

Venice is best very early morning before the cruise ships arrive, although I have not been there in a few years so maybe they come in early now.

>Get away from San Marco<

We weren't anywhere near San Marco.

We stayed in San Polo next to the San Stae vaporetto stop.

The only place we found peace and quiet was the area around Madonna dell' Orto and the area between Fondamente Case Nuove and Arsenale.

All other areas were packed with tourists.

The Zatere wasn't so bad because it is a very wide walkway and you could pass by without getting hit with a shopping bag or camera.

I was hit at least 6 times in the face by morons swinging around with their cameras w/telephoto lens. Idiots. They don't care, they just want their stupid photo--people photographing dead pigeons in St. Marks's Square. Why?



We had many, many delicious and refreshing Aperol spritzes whilst in Venice. Our favoutite place to go for these was Paradiso in the Biennale Gardens.

Our best meals were at >A Beccaficco< in Campo San Stefano. Very Expensive, but brilliant food. We dined here on two occassions and would have come back more often if not for the expense. Lunch for two here ran us 160 euros.

We also liked the pizza at Ae Oche on the Zattere. This place is popular and it is hard to find a table outside with an umbrella to keep the sun off. We only ate here once because of this.

We can also recommend Pizza Alvise on the Fondamente Nuovo near the boat stop to Burano-Murano. The Caprese salads we had here were fresh and delicious--the tomatoes tasted like they just came from the garden.

We had cichetti at All' Arca near the Rialto Market. This bar is opposite the famous Do Mori. There was no place to sit at Do Mori so we went to All' Arca instead. We had our spritzes and some sort of shaved beef on bread. It was very good.

Many times we wouldn't eat a meal in a restaurant, we would just go to Billa and by takeaway salads and sandwiches and eat them on a bench in Campo San Giacomo, our favourite spot in Venice.

Or sometimes we would just eat some gelato whilst walking around.

We found these elliptical-shaped cookies with raisins that we adored and would sometimes just have Cafe Americanos (you have to DEMAND milk for you coffee unless you order the correct one--I think it is Cafe Macchiato but you know I do as I please so would order Cafe Americano with milk) and these cookies at a coffee bar.

Our favoutie church was the Frari. There is a monk's chior here that has intricate carvings you must see to believe. In every nook and crany their is a surprise.

We visited the Peggy Guggenheim collection. The place was filled with horrid Americans making ridiculous comments about art. Why to stupid people go to art museums?

One woman loudly proclaimed to her deer-in-the-headlights husband, "That's a Chagall. He always puts these weird things in the middle of his pictures." They looked at the Chagall for 10 seconds then walked away.

The painting in question had a tree depicted at the center of it. How is that weird?

We LOVED the Joseph Cornell boxes. Couldn't take our eyes off of them.

My eyes hurt, more later.......

Thin