Italy: Venice 2

The Campanile is a tall tower that has 5 different bells on it. They are all different sizes, but ring in the scale of A. One bell announced executions, another "proclaimed a session of the senate,"the third called specific members of a group to a council, the fourth sounded at midday, and the biggest bell gonged at the end of the working day. This tower has been destroyed and rebuilt quite a few times, due to fires.

It costs money to go to the top of the Campanile, but they say it gives a terrific view of the city and the canal, so I persuaded Jeff to go up and take pictures. I waited for him below, in the square, and we were able to see each other:)

Can you see me?

I'm underneath the arch, by the trash can.

Here are some of Jeff's awesome shots from up there:

Venice, Basilica, Doge Palace, Grand Canal

Basilica and Palace

That island across the canal is Lido

There is a really cool clock in the square that displays all 24 hours of the day, the phases of the moon and movement of the sun through the Zodiac symbols. And a little guy hits the bell when it rings. And it's blue and gold with stars on it...

...like so.

St. Mark's Square

We left the famous square, kept an eye out for cool masks, and walked back to Rialto bridge (while crossing several others).

On Rialto bridge--a French girl took our picture.

      Santi Giovanni e Paolo Church

Gelato cone

Gelato cup

We tried to ingeniously find our way back to the train station without a map but ended up walking a lot. We got some more gelato, saw a few more cool buildings, retraced our steps a few times, and almost missed our train, but we made it!

I loved walking through Venice. We were able to take the train out to the island, find our way to St. Mark's Square, Rialto Bridge, etc. After looking at several different shops, Josie bought a hand crafted Venetian mask. Once it got dark, we tried to find our way back to the train station and got lost. We eventually found our way back and I rushed from kiosk to kiosk trying to find out when our train departed. After a minute or two, I found our train and realized that it was set to leave any minute! We ran and got on and rode in between cars because it was so crowded. Josie's feet were killing her all day and was limping around quite a lot by the end. But she was a trooper and we were glad that we had the chance to live so close to Venice.

Tired after a full day of walking.