Life in Venice

One of my favorite places here in Venice is the gondola repair shop along the San Trovaso Canal. It is such a throwback to earlier times and it is one of only two places like it in Venice. Have a loose whatchamacallit on your gondola, pull up and it will be taken care of. Dents or scratches...these guys will take loving care of your baby. Another artist cane along and sketched not far from me. He is here with his wife for 6 weeks. In addition to painting they go to several other places using the cheap European airfares. They rent an apartment in Venice as their home base.

I found this spot later in the day. It is fun to capture some of the green spaces here in Venice.

I keep returning to the same bar in the late afternoon when I'm tired and don't want to be indoors yet. (I think our apartment needs a roof patio so I can have cocktails here.)

But this place always has interesting people to sketch.

The only drawback to the day was experiencing an Italian transportation strike. No vaporettos, buses, or trains were running all day, so that meant walking everywhere...no vaporetto shortcuts. Luckily the strikes usually last only 24 hours.

Last night I went to hear the La Fenice Filharminica with one of the musicians Jerry has been working with. Daniela is a violinist so of course the performance had a guest violinist. Jerry didn't go because his ankle us still bothering him. Hopefully he will be able to deal with the trip to the airport.

Here is the Grand Canal without all the normal traffic.