Ryan, Debi, and Toren Cragun's Blog

Our first stop in Greece was in Corfu, a Greek island in the Ionian Sea.  The ship docked at 8:00 am, so our tour was early again.  Our tour in Corfu included two stops: Achilleion Palace and Palaiokastritsa.  Achilleion Palace was built by the Empress of Austria, Elisabeth of Bavaria. After her death it was purchased by Kaiser Wilhelm II who used it as a summer residence.  Both of them used Achilles as the theme of the palace, thus he figures prominently in the statues, paintings, and design.  The palace itself was mostly unremarkable.  Though there was one element of the whole thing that I found intriguing.  Elisabeth was Catholic, but was living in Greece, which is Greek Orthodox. In order to continue to practice her religion she built a chapel in the palace and provided a room and funds for a priest to stay in the palace as well (in the room next to the chapel).  Yet, the palace is dedicated to a Greek mythological figure, Achilles, and is rooted in Greek mythology with paintings and sculptures depicting Greek gods and Greek myths.  It seems like she took Greek mythology very seriously.  The mixing of monotheism with Greek mythology seemed odd.

Anyway, two of the  remarkable statues of Achilles are located in the garden.  Here’s the first of Achilles triumphant:

Debi in front of Achilles Triumphant - the amazing statue in the garden of the Achilleion Palace overlooking the bay

It’s hard to really capture how stunning this statue is.  It’s obviously quite large (which is why I posted the photo with Debi in it).  But its immensity doesn’t really come across in the photo. Also, it’s location is really remarkable.  It’s overlooking this view:

view from Achilleion Palace (click for larger view)

It’s a stunning view of the bay.  So, the statue is on a promontory overlooking the bay and is really breath taking when you first see it.  Here are the three of us in front of the remarkable view:

Toren, Debi, and I at Achilleion Palace

Not far from the statue of Achilles triumphant is another statue of Achilles, depicting his death:

The Death of Achilles

The statue of Achilles Triumphant was commissioned by Kaiser Wilhelm.  The statue of the Death of Achilles was the favorite statue of Elisabeth and was originally where the statue of Achilles Triumphant stands.

Here’s Debi right behind the Death of Achilles statue by these two odd looking youths:

Debi at Achilleion Palace

The other really great piece of art is this painting of Achilles called “The Triumph of Achilles” which is just above the main stairway in the palace:

The Triumph of Achilles - depicting Achilles dragging Hector at the battle of Troy

It’s enormous, life-like, and extremely well done.  I’m not easily impressed by art, by these three pieces all impressed me.

Here’s one more photo from Achilleion Palace of Debi with her mom:

Debi and Rosemary at Achilleion Palace

From Achilleion Palace we drove about 40 minutes to Palaiokastritsa which is both a municipality and the name of a monastery.  Our tour was of the monastery.  We weren’t that impressed with the monastery itself, as it is highly commercialized.  As an example, here’s a photo of Debi, Toren, and I at the front gate getting a picture with two Greek women dressed in traditional Greek clothing:

Toren, Debi, and Ryan with some Greek women at the highly commercialized Palaiokastritsa monastery

We’re not sure why we bought this (I don’t recall the exact price, but I think it was something like 5 Euros).  But this was how most of the monastery was – lots of stuff for sale.  I’m not sure what the appeal of the monastery was supposed to be.  Not even the chapel was that amazing, as Steve indicated in this photo:

Steve illustrating what most of us thought of the chapel at the monastery

Despite the monastery not being particular amazing, the view from the monastery was really remarkable:

view from Palaiokastritsa monastery

And here’s Debi at the monastery:

Debi at the Palaiokastritsa monastery

Also of interest is the fact that Corfu is considered to be the mythical island of the Phaeacians, which figures prominently in Homer’s Odyssey.  It’s the home of Nausicaa, the princess who helps Odysseus when he is shipwrecked by Poseidon.  According to local legend, Odysseus’s ship was turned to stone and can be seen off the coast of Palaiokastritsa:

Odysseus's petrified ship is the rocky island you see in the center of this picture

I was far more interested in the connection of the island to Homer’s Odyssey than I was in the monastery, but the monastery does have good views of the surrounding coast.  However, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t visit the monastery but rather would take a boat out to the sea caves nearby if I were to visit Corfu again.  The sea caves also figure in the Odyssey and they can be visited today.  Also, the beaches, while they didn’t look like they had great sand, looked like they led to crystal clear water.  There is also a very cool castle in Palaiokastritsa that can be visited, Angelokastro.  So, if you find yourself in Palaiokastritsa, I’d recommend the beach, the sea caves, and the Angelokastro castle.

After our tours, the bus dropped us off near the old fort in Corfu Town and we walked around for a bit.  Debi bought a purse (she’s needed a new one for a while) and I bought a dessert similar to baklava, but slightly different.  It was made with sesame seeds, almonds, and honey.  It was okay, but not particularly great.  The streets of Corfu Town were cool, but it was very busy and very touristy.  We pushed getting back to the ship a bit and ran into some issues getting on the shuttle back to the dock as a lot of people were trying to get back on the later trips, but we eventually muscled our way on to one of the buses and made it back before the ship left (3:30).

We grabbed a late, light lunch at the buffet then crashed again.  Napping the day before screwed up my schedule and I ended up staying up until about 1:00 am writing.  So I was tired again in the afternoon and we all ended up sleeping.  We got up in time to shower and go eat again.  Luckily I skipped breakfast, so I wasn’t putting on weight!  Hooray!

This was the first formal night.  And, thanks to Suzy, both Toren and Ethan had tuxedos, which made them the hit of the ship.  Everyone kept pointing at them and various people wanted pictures with them.  Why, you ask?  Because they were this cute:

Ethan, Toren, and Debi all dressed up

Toren looking dapper

Toren taking a close look at the menu

Toren looking at the fountains in the Centrum

Toren in his tux

We hung around a bit after dinner for the Captain’s welcome then went to bed.

The first stop on our cruise was actually not in Greece but in Split, Croatia.  Why, you ask?  Because it’s about half way between Greece and Italy.  I created a Google Map of our entire trip (flights and cruise), but you can see the route for our cruise ship here (in green):

View Europe Trip – 2010 in a larger map

And who wouldn’t want to go to Croatia, right?  As with Venice, I learned a number of things about Croatia, like the fact that the name “Split” actually comes from a plant (the Spiny Broom) and has nothing to do with the English word “split”.  Split is the second largest city in Croatia and the largest in Dalmatia.  Like many of the places we visited, Split was ruled by the Venetians at one time.  Also, for those who don’t know, Croatia is part of the former Yugoslavia.

Our ship arrived early, 7:00 am, so our tours were early as well.  This was one of two days when we were not all together for the tour.  Gary, Rosemary, and Steve took a walking tour of historic Split, which focused on Diocletian’s Palace, admittedly the most famous attraction in Split.  Suzy, Brent, Ethan, Debi, Toren, and I visited two different sites: Salona, a Roman settlement (Split was also conquered by Rome) and Trogir.

On our way from the port to Salona I snapped a few pictures. This first one is of a high-rise apartment building built during the communist era:

communist construction

For those who don’t know, Yugoslavia was kind of like an independent satellite of the USSR.  It was technically independent, but practically not and was self-governed by communists.  I’ve always wanted to get a picture of the apartments constructed in communist countries in the Eastern Bloc as I’ve heard they were functional but spartan.  I think that’s pretty accurate.

Perhaps of more interest to everyone else is the next photo, which is of a Roman aqueduct:

Roman aqueduct in Split, which is thousands of years old and still standing

When the Romans conquered Split, they built this aqueduct, which was still in use until quite recently.

Salona is about 20 minutes from Split, inland.  It was originally an Illyrian settlement, but it was taken over by the Greeks and then the Romans and eventually became the capital of the Roman province of Dalmatia.  Today, Salona is a ruin, with only about 16% having been excavated.  Much of the original building material has been scavenged over the years for other construction projects.  Our guide walked us through the area, pointing out various Roman structures.  However, I wasn’t able to hear a lot of what was going on.  Toren decided he wanted Debi’s audio receiver and when we tried to take it from him, he refused:

Toren refusing to give up his audio tour guide; photo courtesy of Ethan

Apparently he really wanted to hear what the guide had to say (not really, of course; Debi just let him hold it and put the headphones on then followed me around).

The size of the ruin isn’t apparent when you first walk in to the excavation, but a little further in it becomes apparent that Salona was once a very large town:

a small part of the ruins of Salona; that's Debi, Toren, and I in the center (photo courtesy of Brent)

Here’s Debi in front of some ruins:

Debi in Salona

And here are Toren and I by a doorway among the ruins:

Toren and I amid the ruins of Salona

We spent about 2 hours at Salona, then got back on our bus and drove about 30 minutes to Trogir, which is more of a resort town and is even referred to as “Little Venice” because of its architecture, the fact that it is right on the water, and because it has many buildings built using Venetian architecture as it was controlled by the Republic of Venice as well.  Here’s Debi in front of Fortress Kamerlengo, a castle from the 15th Century that was built by the Venetians:

Debi in front of Fortress Kamerlengo

Trogir is also famous for its churches.  Many of them have bells and for some reason they are not coordinated in any real fashion.  So, around noon, the bell clanging is a true cacophony.  Anyway, the Fortress lies at the end of this really remarkable boardwalk:

the boardwalk in Trogir

If I were looking for a place to vacation with the intention of just relaxing near the water, I’m thinking Trogir would fit the bill.  It’s not very expensive, but beautiful and very laid back, aside from the bell situation.  And it does kind of live up to its nickname of Little Venice with alleys like this:

Debi, Toren, and I down an alley in Trogir

While we wandered around Trogir we found these pretty flowers, which Toren really liked:

Toren playing with flowers

After a couple hours in Trogir (we got some gelato here, too, and it was about as good as that in Venice), we headed back to the ship (which left Split at 2:30 pm).  We grabbed a quick lunch in the buffet restaurant, then headed back to our cabin.  Some of the other people in our party went swimming, but we crashed.  Too many days with too little sleep caught up to me.  Toren, of course, needs naps, and Debi loves them.  So, we slept.  In fact, we slept from just after we ate lunch (around 2:00) until about 6:00, which was a half hour before dinner.  We got up with just enough time to shower before dinner then eat again.  Yes, folks, this is cruising: eat, sleep, shower (got to wash off the crumbs from the previous meal), then eat again!  Uggh!  I know, I shouldn’t complain.  But that is the one thing about cruising that scares me – eating too much.

Anyway, dinner was great, as was expected.  We then went back to the room (dinner, with its three courses, always took from 6:30 until about 8:30) and played with Toren until he fell asleep.  I stayed up taking a few notes for the blog, then we went to sleep as well.

We spent the morning getting everything packed back up and cleaning up the condo.  We were done by about 10:45 and then went to San Samuele, the same place we were dropped off, to get our reserved water taxi (Rosemary arranged that as well).  The water taxi took us up to the port where a bunch of cruise ships were waiting, including ours: Royal Caribbean’s Splendour of the Seas.

We had a little issue checking in as everyone but Gary, Brent and I had had a little cold/runny nose over the previous couple of days.  So, before we could board the nurse onboard the ship had to check everyone out, but we were fine.  Once they cleared us we boarded but couldn’t go to our staterooms until 1:00.  It was around 12:00 at this point.  So we went up to the buffet and grabbed some lunch, then checked into our state rooms.

After we got settled, I walked around the boat with Toren, Steve, Rosemary, and Suzy while Debi got more food (Toren was too tired to let her eat as much as she wanted).  After she got seconds and I returned from my tour of the ship, Debi put Toren down for a nap.  I went up on deck with Steve and Gary to watch as we left Venice.  We had great views of Venice and its many towers while cruising past.  Here’s an example:

Piazza San Marco from the cruise ship

We had a couple hours after we left Venice and were on the open ocean before we had anything planned, so I headed down to the library to do some reading.  The library/game room was my preferred location for reading because no one was ever in there and it has great views.

Our dining time was 6:30 in the nice restaurant (called “The King and I”).  One of the great pleasures of cruising for the family is the nice dinners in the restaurant.  We met up just before 6:30 and went to dinner together.  It was, as we expected, very good.  Here is Toren deciding what he’d like for the evening:

Toren ordering his dinner (he's actually watching a video on my phone)

After dinner we put Toren down and then Rosemary graciously offered to sit in our room with him while Debi and I snuck out to do some dancing.  We haven’t been ballroom dancing since Toren was born, so we took her up on the offer and danced for about 30 minutes.  The only place with ballroom music was in the Centrum, which doesn’t have a good dance floor.  But the band played pretty good Latin music.  After dancing, we went back to our room and went to bed.

Oh, and if anyone is wondering, the cruise was a 7 days Greek Isles cruise.  You’ll see where we stopped over the coming days.

This was our second full day in Venice, and while we didn’t technically have as much planned as the previous day, because of the gorgeous weather, it seems like we got to see a lot more of the city.

We started the day with a 9:30 am visit to the Doge’s Palace.  The Doge was the big cheese during the Venetian Republic, though he couldn’t, technically, make any real decisions without the approval of the senate.  His palace doubled as the center of government that included an aristocratic democracy and various committees and judges.  The Palace itself is pretty remarkable.  Again, we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside, so I didn’t, but you can see some great pictures of some of the rooms (which are enormous considering when they were built) here.  Here’s a shot of Debi, Steve, and Rosemary in front of the Palace:

Debi, Steve, and Rosemary in front of the Doge's Palace

And here’s a shot of St. Mark’s Campanile and the Piazza San Marco from the corner of the Doge’s Palace:

Piazza San Marco from in front of the Doge's Palace

I did sneak one shot while in the Palace.  From the Palace you can cross the Bridge of Sighs I mentioned in my post yesterday.  It’s the bridge to the prison.  I guess you could say it was convenient to have a bridge directly from the court where prisoners were sentenced to their jail where they served their time.  But, admittedly, the view would make you sigh.  Here’s Toren checking it out with Debi:

Toren and Debi looking out from the Bridge of Sighs

The photo is washed out as I took it on my cellphone.  I was trying to be discreet because we weren’t supposed to take photos.

I also filmed this clip of Toren climbing the stairs in the Doge’s Palace:

He wasn’t interested in the amazing artwork or architecture, but he did enjoy climbing the marble stairs.

We spent a good couple of hours at the Palace, then we walked up to Campo San Bartolomeo, which is in the heart of the various shopping districts and close to the outdoor market (which is on the other side of the Rialto Bridge) for lunch.  We had lunch at a restaurant right in the Campo, then split up.  Brent, Ethan, and Gary went back to the condo to take a nap.  Rosemary and Suzy went shopping.  And Steve, Debi, Toren and I went on an adventure.  Our goal: Cross all four Grand Canal bridges (Rialto, Accademia, Calatrava, Scalzi) in a single day and take pictures on as many bridges as we could.  Here’s a rough sense of our plan (and what we did, but Google Maps won’t go over the Calatrava Bridge walking for some reason):

View Larger Map

This is actually much easier than we thought, as Venice is quite small.  The hardest part is just figuring out where you’re going.  Anyway, here are a bunch of photos of us on different bridges:

Toren, Ryan, and Debi on the Rialto Bridge

Debi and Steve on the Rialto Bridge

From the Rialto Bridge we walked through the outdoor market and then got lost in Venezia Sestiere San Polo working our way toward the Scalzi Bridge.

Debi, Ryan, and Toren on a smaller bridge (don't know the name)

Steve and Debi on a smaller bridge

We stopped for gelato at one point since, well, you can never get enough Italian gelato. Here are Steve and Debi ordering their gelato:

ordering gelato in Venice

Debi and Steve eating gelato on another bridge

We eventually made it to the Scalzi Bridge. It was nice just wandering around and not worrying about having to be anywhere.

if you look close, you'll see Toren and I on the Scalzi Bridge

Toren, Debi and I on the Scalzi Bridge

Steve and Debi on the Scalzi Bridge

Steve and Debi on the Calatrava Bridge

Toren, Ryan, and Debi on the Calatrava Bridge

After crossing the Calatrava Bridge, we paused to change Toren’s diaper (on the side of a canal, of course):

changing Toren's diaper by a canal in Venice

We then stopped for a bit to let Toren run around in a plaza.  He wasn’t interested in the gondolas gliding past, or the other boats, or even the water for that matter.  He was interested in the pine needles that had fallen off the pine tree in the middle of the plaza.  And he was adorably cute as he walked around, so I did an impromptu photo shoot of him in Venice:

Note all the gondolas lined up in the background.

I snapped a couple of Debi as well:

And here’s some footage of Toren running around the plaza:

After Toren’s break in the plaza, we continued our trek back toward the Accademia Bridge, crossing more small bridges along the way:

Debi and Steve on another bridge

It took us a while, but we eventually made our way to the Accademia Bridge:

Steve and Debi on the Accademia Bridge

While wandering around in the south west region of Venice, we realized it isn’t as busy as the area near Piazza San Marco and, amazingly, it’s less expensive.  We even scouted out a restaurant for our last night in Venice.  If you have free time in Venice, definitely check out areas further away from Piazza San Marco; they are calmer, which is nice given the bustle around the Piazza.

We made it back to the condo around 3:30, just in time to take a break before we headed out for a gondola ride.  Of course, when you’re in Venice you have to go on a gondola ride, even though it’s something of a racket (80 euros for 40 minutes – crazy!).  But I’m glad we did, not only because I can say that I’ve been in a Venetian gondola, but because it’s actually quite relaxing and calming once you leave the Grand Canal and head down the side canals (we went down Rio de San Maria Zobenigo).  It’s calm and quiet and very peaceful.  We snapped a few pictures of the gondola ride as well, of course:

Gary, Rosemary, Brent, Suzy, and Ethan in their gondola; their gondolier sang them a song spontaneously; pretty cool

Debi, Toren, and I, and yes, Toren's hand is where you think it is; that's one more thing he's done that most people hasn't, been breastfed in a Venetian gondola

our gondolier chatting on his iPhone

After the gondola ride, we crossed over the Accademia Bridge and had dinner at a nice little restaurant, Restaurant de Traviso, with a covered patio.  It was the best and cheapest food we had in Venice.  They were also very accomodating of our kids, which was good because Toren and Ethan were all over the place.  This is a great place for a quiet dinner away from the crowds.

After dinner, Brent, Suzy, Ethan, Rosemary, and Debi went to a fashion show in Piazza San Marco and Steve, Gary, Toren and I got gelato in the campo right by our condo and hung out.  Every place we visited there were people hawking small trinkets.  One of these guys was hawking bouncing balls that light up when you bounce them in the plaza.  He was slick.  While Toren was running around, he grabbed one of his balls, bounced it so it lit up, then handed it to Toren.  You would have thought Toren won the lottery.  I couldn’t pry it away from him without him putting up a serious fight and crying.  So I ended up buying it.  I’m not usually one for buying toys spontaneously, so I was bit perturbed, but watching Toren play with the ball was pretty darn cute.  In fact, lots of people in the campo thought he was cute, so it was probably worth it.

We did have a minor issue at the end of the night.  Debi said she’d be home at 10:00 pm, which is about when Toren was going to sleep at this point.  Toren was clearly tired by 9:45, but Debi has been nursing him to sleep and well, that’s something I can’t do.  So, come 10:00 pm, when Debi hadn’t returned from the fashion show, Toren started to cry… Then scream…  He wanted his mom and his milk.  The sippy cup with milk and cuddling I tried just didn’t cut it.  He wore himself out crying and screaming by 10:30 and fell asleep.  Debi got home at 10:35.  That was a bit perturbing, but otherwise it was a good night.

Unfortunately, the day we had the most planned in Venice was also the day that it rained.  We started out with an 11:00 am walking tour of the city (in the rain) that started at the Royal Gardens (Giardinetti Reali) near Piazza San Marco.  Our guide walked us around the Piazza, explaining its history.  There are four major buildings surrounding the square: The Doge’s Palace (Palazzo Ducale), the Marciana Library (Biblioteca Marciana), Saint Mark’s Basilica (Basilica Cattedrale Patriachale di San Marco), and the Procuratie, which is made up of several buildings: the Procuratie Vecchie, Procuratie Nuove, St. Mark’s Clocktower, and the Napoleonic Wing of the Procuraties.  There’s also a large bell tower in the middle of the square, St. Mark’s Campanile (Campanile di San Marco), which you can climb (we didn’t but should have).  One of our first stops was the Doge’s Palace, but we didn’t go in (we visited it the next day, though).  We also stopped at the the Bridge of Sighs (Ponte dei Sospiri), which is a bridge from the Doge’s Palace, where criminals were sentenced, to the prison, where they served their time.  The bridge was named by Lord Byron based on the suggestion that prisoners would sigh at their final view of beautiful Venice before being taken down into their cells.  Here’s Debi in front of what can be seen of the Bridge of Sighs (a lot of Piazza San Marco was under renovation when we visited):

The Ponte dei Sospiri or Bridge of Sighs is the white bridge you can see just above Debi's head (for a better picture, see here)

From here we walked to Saint Mark’s Basilica.  It would be a major understatement to call this church “gaudy”.  Apparently it’s nickname is the Church of Gold, which makes sense given that there are, according to our tour guide, 8,000 square meters of gold leaf on the ceiling and walls.  Here’s a shot of the outside:

Saint Mark's Basilica

Our tour included entrance into the Basilic (without waiting, which was nice given the lines).  You’re not supposed to take pictures inside, so we didn’t.  But someone did and posted it on Wikipedia, so you can see that I’m not kidding about the gold leaf.  The Basilica is a pretty good illustration of just how wealthy the Venetians were at the height of their power.  After the Basilica, our guide walked us through a number of Venetian streets and alleys, stopping at some of the churches and other places of interest, including the general whereabouts of Marco Polo‘s home in Venice (it’s no longer standing, but they know about where it was).  Our tour ended around 1:30 near the Rialto Bridge, which is one of four bridges that crosses the Grand Canal.  It rained during the whole tour.  After the tour ended, we headed back to the condo.  The rain stopped just as we got back to the condo, of course.

Steve and I went out and got pizza and paninis for everyone for lunch.  We ate in the condo so we could dry out.

We had another tour – a boat tour of Venice – scheduled for 4:20 that left from Piazza San Marco.  It wasn’t raining while we walked to the Piazza, but as soon as we got on the boat, a massive storm hit.  It was bad enough that the boat driver pulled up a side canal and tied the boat up for about 10 minutes to wait out the worst of it.  The rain was so bad we could barely see out the windows of the boat, both from the windows fogging up on the inside and from the rain on the outside.  To wipe the fog off the windows we ended up using some of Toren’s diapers from his backpack.  Despite the terrible weather, we continued the tour and learned some interesting things about Venice from our very nice and knowledgeable tour guide.  Not having spent much time thinking about the trip beforehand, there was a lot I didn’t know about Venice.  Here are some of the interesting nuggets of information I learned:

• The Venetians were a separate city-state from the rest of Italy up until the early 1800s (after they were conquered by France a couple of times under Napoleon).  During that time the Republic of Venice was quite powerful and obviously very wealthy.  Their wealth derived from their sea trade and most of the territory they controlled was coastal.
• While Catholic, the Venetians did not follow political instruction from the Pope and kind of kept their distance religiously as well, but recognized the Pope’s supremacy religiously.
• Venetian is a separate language from Italian.  Many Venetians still speak it.
• At it’s peak, about 250,000 people lived in Venice.  Today it’s about 60,000.
• The word “ghetto” comes from “ghetor” or “ghet” (soft “gh”) which means “slag” in Venetian.  The Jewish merchants from Germany who moved to Venice ended up in an area with a forge/foundry.  The German Jews couldn’t say “ghetto” (soft “gh”), so it became “ghetto” (hard “gh”). This is one of the claimed etymologies of the word “ghetto” (the other is from Italian “borghetto,” which is a dimunitive of “borgo” (borough).  The first Jewish ghetto was in Venice.

Here’s a shot of Rosemary, Gary, Suzy, and Ethan inside the boat in the rain:

Rosemary, Gary, Suzy, and Ethan in our rainy boat tour

After the tour, we got off the boat in the rain and basically ran back to the condo.  Just as we got back, the rain stopped (of course).  It was about 7:00 pm at this point and we were trying to figure out what to do for dinner.  We initially thought we could just get take out from one of the nearby restaurants since no one wanted to go back out for fear it would rain again.  We checked at a couple of nearby restaurants, but it turns out Venetian restaurants don’t do take out.  Who knew?!?  We then considered just cooking in the condo, since the kitchen had the requisite pots, pans, and utensils.  However, by the time we decided to go this route, the nearby supermarket closed (15 minutes early, of course), so we ended up buying pizza for dinner as well.  Here’s a photo of Brent and Steve standing in a campo while we waited for our pizza:

Brent and Steve in a campo watching Ethan run around while we waited for our pizza

Brent, Steve, Ethan and I, while waiting for the pizza, also stopped at a church turned museum (pretty common in Venice; a lot of the churches are now museums) exploring the history of the violin and of Vivaldi.  It was a little awkward because it talked about Vivaldi, but all the exhibits were musical instruments and Vivaldi was a composer, not a maker of music instruments.  Regardless, it was cute little free museum that occupied our time while we waited for our pizza.  Oh, and I did learn that Vivaldi was a priest who was reprimanded by the Catholic Church for his fixation on music and the theater.  That was interesting.

That pretty much wrapped up our first full day in Venice.