Trips

Mon., 7/27/15 – Venice
            We met our new Grand Circle tour guide at 8:45 this morning - Julia is excellent. She took us on a walk around our hotel neighborhood and the Jewish ghetto.  We walked down a narrow alley to a little park with grass, trees, flowering shrubs, and a playground.  It was a hidden gem because there is not much greenery in Venice.  Julia showed us a cooking oil recycling bin.  Much of Venetian food is cooked in oil, either olive or canola.  We went through a gate into the old Jewish ghetto.  Jews were made to live in a single neighborhood.  The gate was closed at night to keep the Jews in or the other citizens out.  There are two Holocaust memorials in the ghetto square where the synagogue is: one depicts Nazi brutality against the Jews and the other contains the names of all the Venetian Jews sent to concentrations camps surrounding a sculpture of the Last Train.    We left the ghetto over a bridge that once had a drawbridge that was closed every night to isolate the Jews.

 

View of the Grand Canal from our hotel room	That's our Hotel Continental with the peeling plaster just above the boat.
Cistern in a courtyard	Recycling vegetable oil used for cooking
	Jewish ghetto
Synagogue	Synagogue
Holocaust Memorial - depicting Nazi brutality against the Jews	Holocaust Memorial - the Last Train
Ghetto drawbridge	Julia pointed out a shop selling wine at which you could bring your own plastic bottle and they will fill it with wine.  Various wines sold for 2 to 2.6 Euros per liter!     We walked to a gondola boat yard.  Most of the work is done to maintain the 500 gondolas in operation.  There has only been one female gondolier.
Bring your own plastic bottle - great prices!	Veggie market
Egret - in Venice	Gondola boat yard
Gondola boat yard	Gondola boat yard
Gondola boat yard	We looked across Giudecca Canal at Giudecca Island.  The canal is the shipping lane for cruise ships and large ships.  There were once many factories on Giudecca.  One large building that was once a flour factory is now a Hilton Hotel with a garden and swimming pool on its roof.             We walked by Santa Maria dei Rosario(I Gesuati) Church and paid 3 Euros to go in and see some Tiepolo paintings: Apparition of the Virgin to St. Dominic, The Institution of the Rosary, and The Glory of St. Dominic.
Santa Maria dei Rosario	Santa Maria dei Rosario - Ceiling by Tiepolo
Santa Maria dei Rosario	Santa Maria dei Rosario - Sculptures by Morlaiter
Santa Maria dei Rosario - Abraham	Cut wall cutout for a doggie drinking bowl
Man playing a glass harp	We walked past several art galleries.  In the corner of two buildings, Julia showed us what looks to be an angled seat.  Its purpose is to keep men from urinating there.
Angled seat to prevent men from urinating in the corner	Courtyard with more contemporary art
Giudecca Canal and Santa Maria della Salute	Bell tower of Santa Maria della Salute
Santa Maria della Salute	We ended our tour with Julia at a photo stop below the church of Santa Maria della Salute, looking across at the Doge’s Palace and the entry to St. Mark’s Plaza.

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