Marathon Day

The rain cleared up, so we packed a lot into the day on Monday. Went through the Accademie Galleries and our fill of Venetian Art in what used to a monastery, I think. Each gallery had written guides that were mostly in the right place, but were marginally useful. The descriptions tended to be focused on where the piece had come from, and what room in the Accademie it had been located in previously, and then a whole lot of "Venetian Art is the Best and Most Important in the World" verbiage...and a little light on information about the artist or the scene being depicted.

Had lunch along the Grand Canal (here is proof that we lied to Ryne about there being no pepperoni pizza in Italy:

 

And I got my gondola ride! It was actually very very good - totally touristy, but definitely worth doing. We did the "standard" which is a bit of the Grand Canal and then lots of the smaller ones.

The line was short today at San Marco, so despite protests from the younger Weisenbergers, we went there next. The complaints dried up once we were in the basilica. While the claim that Venetian Art is the most important in the world is debatable, there's no doubt that they have the whole "Glory to God" thing down. The mosaic work is stupendous. Wow. Sorry, no photos - not allowed. We went out on the terrace, more great views of the city and the square, and the child who worries me:

We headed over to the Doge's Palace and that was also amazing.

It was a very long day, and way too much time on our feet. Took a short break back at the hotel and headed out to a very good dinner at Pizzaria Casin dei Nobili. I had St. Peter's Fish,  which is apparently tilapia or similar fish in a garlic and parsley sauce. The guys had pizza, and swore it was the last time they would order it...much to the amusement of the couple next to us who were from San Diego and had been traveling since March 12. They were also tired of pizza. It's much more prevalent than you think, and not just at the tourist places. Anyway, this couple gave us some good tips for Rome, including downloading podcasts for the sites, which they felt were generally better than the audioguides - and our experience with audioguides and written information has not been the greatest so far, so we'll try it.