Venice

Venice. Venezia. La Serenissima.

Those words invoke such expectation, it’s really rather difficult to put my own thoughts to paper. I just don’t know how to describe my experience of visiting Venice. Needless to say, so many literary geniuses have written about the city before that I hardly dare do so myself, seeing as I’m a total hack.

Venice felt like a strange kind of dream. Throughout your life, you get to see so many pictures and hear so many accounts of this extraordinary city that on arrival you get the impression that you already know the place. Which is ridiculous, of course, because you’ve never been there before. But you do recognise so many buildings and landmarks that some sort of familiarity creeps up on you. I don’t know about you, but I was totally freaked out by that.

Talking about freaks, all those tourists drove me mad. Unfortunately, I had time for only a daytrip and to make matters worse, I had to go during the Easter holidays. This meant that the whole of Venice was packed to breaking point with tourists. Now I know I shouldn’t be complaining about tourists, as I am one myself, but I just don’t know how the people of Venice cope with this onstorm. If I was living in a place that was overrun by such numbers of tourists, I’d go berserk.

But please don’t let my complaining put you off – Venice is well worth a trip, it’s full of the most amazing, beautiful buildings and steeped in such a rich and varied history you’d have to be insane not to want to go. The World Heritage Site is comprised of the city of Venice and its lagoon. I will definitely have to come back at some stage and explore in more detail. Hopefully this article and photos offer a first impression.

Please note that this blog post was first published on January 20th, 2015 my previous blog ‘Inside Chrissie’s Mind’, and has been amended slightly.

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