Grand Canal

It is like nothing else.

When you walk out the front doors of that train station and the canal, the Grand Canal is right in front of you.

There's nothing like

it.

So one for dinner.

If you want to avoid touristy spots, do not eat at a restaurant on what is the Grand Canal.

Yes.

Even if it looks authentic, it sometimes can be hard to judge that.

I'm not... trying to knock any sort of mom and pop business that is on the Grand Canal.

But it can be hard to identify.

So I would just say if you don't want to eat at a touristy restaurant, avoid places on the Grand Canal.

Well,

Next up is Peggy Guggenheim in London, the making of a collector at the Royal Academy.

That's from November 21st as well to March 14th, before she became a legendary collector whose palazzo on the Grand Canal is now one of Venice's great museums.

Peggy Guggenheim ran a small daring gallery on Cork Street in London called the Guggenheim Jun for just two years from 1938 to 1939.

In that brief window, she introduced Britain to some of the most radical art of the age, Dali art.

Yet this obligation is laid, not only on every pedestrian visitor who calls on the dwellers in Venetian palaces, but on every modern traveller brought by railway to the city of the lagoons.

its visitors of old time were more fortunate they approached this citta nobilissima e singolare by ways which enabled them to taste its quality from afar they saw its distant campanile as they sailed across the adriatic from trieste or they came like john evelyn in sixteen forty five by brondolo and chioggia over against malamocco the chief port and anchorage where our english merchantmen lie that trade with venice and here entering the lagoon they slipped into the bacino di san marco the campanile beckoning them on till their progress was arrested by the custom-house which looks seaward from the sharp point of dorsoduro or like shakespeare's portia they might come from padua travelling by barge along the brenta through the level green water-meadows to and there embarking on the common ferry which trades to venice they approached the city by the broad giudecca channel or again if they had crossed the alps by the brenner pass they left their carriages and all the toils and fatigues of travel at mestre and there entered a gondola the reviving salt breeze and the masses of heaving seaweed proclaiming the vicinity of the adriatic then they rode across the lagoon slowly nearing the city which lay like a big lotus leaf on its bosom not surrounded like other mediaeval towns by defences of masonry but having these shining expanses of water alike for road and rampart and when the low shore of the mainland behind them had become a mere wavering neutral tinted line the boat swept into the canal of canareggio and then passed the church of s jeremia into the grand canal the broadest and most stately street in europe yet what the modern traveller loses in aesthetic satisfaction he gains in sensations of astonishment no previous preparation descriptive or photographic can seriously diminish the delightful thrill experienced by the newcomer to venice as he leaves the railway platform and emerges on the station quay overlooking the grand canal there by the broad flight of water-steps the cabs of venice the hired gondolas are waiting in a black mass for the arrival of the express trains as soon as the first luggage laden figure appears on the quay the mass becomes agitated the air is rent with cries the offering gondola gondola from the water from the shore the imperative pope pope boatman of blue-vested facchini anxious to secure a good boat for the signori who have tipped them well or the christian name of some private gondolier francesco luigi pietro or what not is shouted and a reassuring ecco mi signorina pronto signore comes from some stalwart standing form who presently with marvellous dexterity will manage to extricate his gondola from the crowd avoid the wash of a steamer making for the station pontoon to the left and draw up at some spot on the outskirts of confusion many of the best hotels now send a steam launch as station bus to meet expected guests this is an advantage to the traveller who is going for the bathing season straight out to the lido otherwise time seems dearly gained at the expense of the restful motion of the old-fashioned gondola one of the most characteristic and delicious features of life in the lagoons to arrive uncertain of one's destination and without the power to conceal the fact beneath a mask of assumed decision is to be the victim of the knot of hotel porters who command the station exit chanting the names of their houses prepared to pounce like spiders on any vacillating fly happy is the man who has come to stay in venice with some of its residents and is met on arrival by his host's private gondola manned by two gondoliers happier still is he if his friends refrain from coming to welcome him in person to feel oneself propelled with the easy speed of the double oar to observe without fully comprehending to yield oneself silently to wholly new sensations this is the way to enjoy to the full the luxury of arrival Travellers who have crossed the Alps often come by an express train from Milan which reaches Venice near midnight.

Those who have crossed the Apennines often enter with the dawn.

Both hours are favourable to striking first impressions.

as the night train leaves the station at mestre and steams across the bridge built by the austrians to link their conquest with the mainland the lights of venice gleam brightly in the midst of a plain dark water and the unique situation of the city of refuge is realised more vividly than when the eye is dazzled by sunlight and distracted by the unending variations of cloud and reflection then when the restful gondola is reached and the traveller begins to move along the waterway he is penetrated by the novelty of its silence in the darkness he strains his ears rather than his eyes and the only sounds which meet them are the rhythmical dip of the oar the lapping of the tide against marble steps the weirdly melodious cry of the gondolier sent forth in warning as he rounds a corner or overtakes another boat residents in venice know that the stillness is fallacious experience quickly teaches that human voices echo through the silence made by the absence of traffic that narrow foot-passages and waterways are funnels up which sounds of steps or of revellers songs ascend to upper windows that italians seem able to reduce the hours of sleep to a minimum that when wine-shops disgorge their cheerful occupants vivacious discussion will continue on the nearest bridge that solitary wayfarers are apt to enliven a night tramp with reproductions allegro and combrio of the popular operatic tune and finally that certain gondoliers are bound by the laws of the municipio to be on duty all night at the traghetti ferries and are determined that some of the inhabitants of the surrounding houses shall share their vigil but the traveller is still ignorant of these facts though he may discover some of them all too soon when he retires weary to his couch for the moment this quiet water transit possesses him this arrival so unlike the drive from the station in any other city seaport or country village he plunges wandering into the dim side canals scarcely able to discern the outline of the masonry through the shadow of which he passes all that is mean and ugly hidden by the darkness and a mystery adding allurement to the beauty half revealed then he emerges again into the moonlight space of the grand canal with its bordering of stately palaces some are shuttered and lightless and the gondola of the house sparecchiata despoiled of all but its frame heaves fastened to its palli the tall posts before the door others have no gondola while a single light is burning in the water entrance indications that the owners are still abroad and are expected home anon or again there is a long row of lighted windows from which issue gusts of laughter merriment and music while below a black group of gondolas lies awaiting the close of an evening reception then if the traveller is bound for one of the hotels near st mark's there will intervene another short cut another sudden plunge into a side canal till finally he emerges into a great stretch of scintillating moonswept water giving back the lights of the piazzetta and widening seaward to the shimmering lagoon but if the traveller come when the shadows are slipping downwards from the palaces like a discarded garment sliding to the feet and the expanse of lagoon and wide channel are growing grey and faintly luminous he will find a quieter station a less confused embarkation and a more refreshing breeze than at any other hour then too he will have glimpses of the city's provisioning invisible to later risers of barges bearing milk from the mainland of boats laden with market-garden produce of a bustle accompanied by the sound of many voices about the rialto and the fish-market then too if the weather favour him he will see two sights of magical loveliness looking seawards the dome of the church of the madonna della salute with all its delicate barocco twirls and spirals a wondrous brittle dome of wizardry outlined against a sky whose pale intensifying light is veiled in a transparent pearly haze looking landwards the whole line of the alps white crested with a sprinkling of newly fallen snow or gleaming in silver and pale purple through the tremulous white of a summer dawn the sunset may show them again revealing more clearly to the west the mountains above vicenza but never do they look so ethereal so dreamlike as in the pure light of early morning the medal like every other made of earthly metal has its reverse after the delicious roe from the station comes the reckoning often a disagreeable awakening from a pleasant dream the english or american visitor is nowadays regarded as the rightful prey of the gondolier whom he has spoilt by misplaced generosity and whom he sometimes irritates by unjust suspicion The course from the station to the fashionable hotels is a long one, and the foreigner's luggage is often weighty.

Sometimes the gondolier is outrageous in his demands, sometimes the forestieri are unreasonable in their withholdings.

When a wrangle ensues, the latter are at a disadvantage, for even should they understand and speak Italian, they are likely to be worsted when the excited Venetian slips into his own dialect.

the writer remembers how not long ago two young english ladies going to a pension not on a canal besought the gondolier to carry their trunks from the landing-place to the door of their lodging the man refused to do so unless he were paid a preposterous extra fee it was late and the frightened girls were about to capitulate when two english gentlemen came to the traghetto overhearing the altercation they dismissed the gondolier with a threat of report to the vigili police and themselves carried their compatriots trunks to the pension entrance again if a moonlight night on the lagoons holds a charm unknown to the mainland if the dawn seems more magical the midday sunshine more effulgent it cannot be denied that a wet day is drearier and more uncomfortable in venice than in any other european city there are days when we would thankfully exchange the steamer for a rattling bus and the noiseless gondola for a snorting taxicab when all traffic is dislocated by fog or wind when even the shelter of a felze the hearse-like hood of the gondola is denied to us and it is an adventure to cross the grand canal near its mouth and impossible to steer across the channel of the giudecca in such weather an arrival at night is no delicious dream but a veritable nightmare no gondolas are waiting at the station stairs and the traveller stands dripping and impatient while a shivering facchino shouts porpe till he is hoarse If the wind is strong and gusty, it may be necessary to employ a second rower, Secondoremo, to avoid the wider canals as far as possible, and to study carefully both wind and tide.

I like it.

So we're talking about the Cant Dario, the cursed palace on the Grand Canal.

Love it.

What a name.

Just wanted to kind of keep it fresh, you know?

Oh, I like that.

So it's a four-story mansion on the Grand Canal, and it's almost at the tip of the Dorso Duro neighborhood, really quite close to the Church of Santa Maria della Salute.

If you've been to Venice or seen pictures, it is a stone's throw, one might say, from that church.

This thing is currently for sale, which I would recommend not to buy, but yeah.

So there is a beautiful palazzo on the Grand Canal, perfectly situated, more or less center of the city, which is called the Palazzo Dario, or Ca Dario, which was built in a 15th century Gothic palace, beautiful, but the problem is that this house will kill you.

Okay, so it's in the Dorsoduro district, really near, very near to the Peggy Guggenheim Museum collection thing, if anyone knows where that is.

I do.

So I'm five years now, alcohol free.

I was just in Italy, in Venice, on the Grand Canal.

Everybody I work with, everybody I talked to when we first started was like, there's no way I can go to Europe and not drink.

Right.

When Antonio da Ponte redesigned it, he specifically planned shops on top of the bridge in a very clear way.

The Rialto spans the Grand Canal, the main artery coursing through the commercial heart of Venice, a city of islands sutured together by hundreds of exquisite bridges.

Every single little canal has its own bridge, and very often some houses have their own private bridge.

So there's just bridges absolutely everywhere.

The Chinese build arches on soft ground and have done for longer than Venice.

So let's just assume that the Chinese design found its way to Venice along the Silk Road with Marco Polo.

The Rialto is not only the oldest, but unfortunately the most popular bridge crossing the Grand Canal, with many Venetians arguing it's in danger of being loved to death.

60,000 visitors a day exact a hefty toll.

The church of the Scalzi has a broad staircase in red broccatelle of Verona, with truncated columns in marble, gigantic prophets, stone balustrades, and doors of mosaic.

the romanesque churches are really beautiful with their pillars of porphyry antique capitals images standing out upon a glitter of gold byzantine mosaics slender columns and carved trefoils the church of santa maria della salute has been made famous by the picture of her by canaletto in the louvre one of the most beautiful things within is a ceiling by venetian arabesque ornament of the quattricento is tenderly sculptured and the friezes are undercut in a reverent and delicate manner one of the most beautiful palaces of the grand canal is the palazzo corner spinelli it is especially noticeable because of the number of windows in the basements there is no observable order in the placing of them then again there are contrasts in the shape of balconies some are small and curved inwards others are long and straight in fourteen eighty one the palaces became of a more advanced character the central windows were grouped together but this last feature is characteristic of venetian architecture of all periods one of st michele's finest works is the palazzo grimanni on the grand canal it was carried out by others after st michele's death nevertheless it is very fine it has great dignity and majesty and is a composition such as will be found in venice alone venice is architecturally the most interesting city in italy it contains works of all periods from the early christian foundation to the eighteenth century and perhaps the best examples of each are there first there was the school of the lombardy next that of s michele and s sovino quite distinct and influenced direct from rome then came closely following the schools of palladio and scamozzi and a fourth is that of the seventeenth century artists who did good work in venice but on different lines The best example of this late period in Venice is Santa Maria della Salute, erected in token of the cessation of the plague.

It is situated at the sea gate to the presence chamber of the Queen of the Adriatic.

Few churches of any age can rival it architecturally, the composition is mainly pyramidal.

The Venetians wanted form and colour in their pictures, but they wanted also a suggestion of distance and atmosphere.

In those early pictures, you find that painters smeared their distance to give it a blurred look.

that was the beginning of perspective painters of this period seem to have been marvellously modern they were quite in the movement there has never been any attempt at harking back to earlier periods venice was very wealthy at this time and venetian people never missed an opportunity of parading wealth they loved glory where the state was concerned and encouraged pageantry by both land and sea they loved to see doge and senators in their gorgeous robes either on the piazza or on the grand canal then there came a demand for painted records of these processions and ceremonials all this was encouraged by the state for political reasons pageantry entertained the people and at the same time made them less inquisitive much better these great officials argued that the people should be enjoying things in this way than that they should begin to inquire into the doings of the state gentile bellini and carpaccio were the first pageant painters of the period paolo veronese who came much later also loved pageantry elevated it to the height of serious art and idealised prosaic magnificence he painted great banquets and combined ceremony splendour and worldliness with childlike naturalness and simplicity First of all, as has been shown, it was the church that called for pictures to represent their saints and to enforce biblical legends.

Painting became more and more popular.