Venice & the Veneto [antikvár]

Perhaps Turner captured its essence best. Elusive, floating, enigmatic, Venice rides in a misty middle distance of muted colours and sounds, a dreamlike place that defies definition and beggars description. In this improbable city, built upon islets and platforms of countless pylons slammed over the centuries into the mud of the lagoon, people go about their business, traipsing along lanes and beside canals, up and down the countless bridges. The air hums to the sound of padding feet, chatter resonating off the walls along narrow» crooked streets and bustling, uneven squares. Down the centuries, the city's builders seem to have delighted in variety: from the great mosaics of the Basilica di San Marco and Torcello to the sober Gothic majesty of the Chiesa di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, from the simplicity of Romanesque to the discipline of Palladio, from the sensuality of Veneto-Byzantine to the extremes of baroque, the concentration of architectural gems is astonishing. The same is true of its art - the parade of past greats from the Venetian school seems infinite. The number of masterpieces left behind by Tiepolo, Tintoretto, Veronese, Titian and others in the city adds up to the equivalent of death-by-chocolate for art lovers. The roads of Venice are made of water. Fire engines, police, ambulances and taxis tootle about as wheeled vehicles would elsewhere, only here they are boats and the speed limit is 5km/h. Not thai anyone seems to enforce the limit; suntanned taxi drivers pound about in their expensive, oak-panelled vessels, dodging exasperated gondoliers with their boatloads of enthralled visitors.