Our second day in northern Italy was the day we’d picked to check out Venice. We drove back to Sacile and caught the train from there to the Venezia Santa Lucia station, right in the center of town.

As soon as you exit the train station, you know exactly where you are. The canals, the buildings — right outside.

Venice is full of fantastic photo opportunities. If you can’t take at least one good shot while you’re there, the problem is with you, not with your camera or the city.

We walked from the station to the Marco Polo square, which is home to the Doge Palace (so palace, much statue) and the Basilica di San Marco. There’s plenty to see along the way:

Eventually we followed the river of tourists and reached the square. First the Basilica:

And the Doge Palace is right next door: 

The architecture of the basilica in particular is a great example of how Venice’s alliance with the eastern late Roman empire influenced the culture and artistic sensibilities. There’s a strong Byzantine influence that I knew NOTHING about until we were standing in front of the Basilica and Travis told me about it. Given that I once wanted a graduate degree in art history focusing on Byzantine religious art and architecture, I feel like I should have already known this, but at least now I have an interesting set of things to research!

Part of the square has a waterfront. We had no desire to go for a gondola ride as it’s pretty dang cliched, but I liked this shot of some of the gondolas tied up at the dock.

We thought about joining the lines of people to enter the Basilica and the Palace, but at that point we were lined, museumed, and touristed out. I don’t believe in going through a building or a site simply because it’s there and it’s a Thing To Do In A List Of Things To Do — if you’re not interested, go to something else. We decided to grab some lunch instead, and found a small place still full of tourists but slightly off the well worn path. Actually, it wasn’t lunch, it was a snack, because all we had was water, prosecco, and a piece of cake. 😛 The waiter was not amused with our order, but he brought it anyway.

I liked the pigeons that hung out near the restaurant.

After that we started walking back to the train station. We passed by a store claiming to be the most beautiful bookstore in all the world, so we walked in. If not the most beautiful, it was certainly the most chaotic, and an absolute treasure trove of potential — piles of used and new books, unsorted, everywhere. The back of the store held a small courtyard, where the owner had built up some steps out of books to look out onto the canal. I can’t decide if this is brilliant or painful.

Two other shots that I took along the way:  I wish I would’ve done a whole series of pictures of Dogs in Italy. So many just hanging out in the doors of the shops owned by their humans.

So what of Venice? I was warned ahead of time that it is definitely something to see, and not least because it’s disappearing. It’s a slow sink at 4mm a year, but still.

Venice has been called one of the saddest cities in the world, the epitome of “elegant decay.” It is flooded not just with water but the tourists, like ourselves, looking for pictures and a last look before the city is gone. Perhaps it’s because we didn’t spend much time there, but to me, it felt as though Venice had lost it’s soul. At best, it’s hidden it from the greedy eyes of those who want to “do Venice like a local.” At worst, it goes stumbling half-drunk from party to party to do those two or three tricks everyone loves and talks about, but couldn’t carry on a conversation. I think that’s too harsh of an assessment, though. Venice is better than that, its heart remains, and I’ll be watching to see what the Venetian independence movement comes up with in the future.

There’s so much to see there, with so much history and beauty, but it felt more respectful somehow to come, see, marvel, and leave it in peace — or if not peace, at least two people less of chaos.