Venice 2021

This article is part of the Most Privileged Tourist series.  Which follows my travels in Italy during Covid restrictions. The quiet and solitude in places usually hustling and bustling with tourists evokes mixed emotions. It is undoubtedly a wonderful delight and privilege to see these sights without the crowds, but it is also a reminder of how much Italy's tourist industry and so many Italians have suffered during the pandemic. To remain positive - my mission in the Most Privileged Tourist series is to ignite and stoke your passion to travel; so that when you can, you can help unfreeze these gems from their current cryogenic state and help the industry thrive again. In the meantime please stay safe and consider this series as the start of your next journey, enjoy and share with friends.

Today, Venice is 1,600 years old - its birthday has gone almost unacknowledged. It should have been a huge event with celebrations and parties but instead it is just another quarantine birthday. Let me tell you about it's 1,599th year and how things can only get better. Of all the most privileged tourist tales I will tell - Venice during restrictions may have been the most privileged of all my trips and maybe the saddest. Let me tell you why.

As our world changed overnight in early 2020, Venice changed too: in 2019 Venice had 13 million overnight stays. Every day there were 431,000 beds available in the Venice area. 11 million visitors were international visitors. 1,190 hotels and 8,469 registered Airbnb's lost their trade and remain even to this day restricted. Conferences and tour buses were canceled, and the tourists already in the Veneto scrambled to leave. Italy was the first European country to lockdown its citizens and there was a small window of time when the tourists left As tourism vanished, restaurants closed and residents waited in their small apartments on extreme lockdown for the world to return to normal but as you know it has not yet.

There have been gondoliers in Venice for over a 1000 years, the first official mention was in 1093.  At one time there were 10,000 gondoliers but now 433 official licensed gondoliers take visitors on their once in a lifetime trip. To become a gondolier, one must have some knowledge of Voga alla Veneta rowing and handling a gondola. After passing a rowing test and a swimming test, the students are accepted into the ‘Arte del Gondoliere’ school. The courses last for 12-18 months and combine language, history, local geography and of course rowing. The final exams include a more specific rowing exam. (1)

Gondola prices range from between 20,000 and 50,000 euros, depending on the finishing and materials used and have been black since 1562 when Doge Girolamo Priuli issued a ban on colorful gondolas. Colored gondolas are only used for regattas.  The gondoliers in their usual blue or red striped T-shirts and straw hats were ominously absent in May 2020. Their gondolas tethered to the shore symbolic of the people who own them.

May 25th 2020, was a refreshing change for us. We had been to Venice before lockdown. Yes certainly a magical event but also a constant navigation of people; crowded shops, squares, strollers and congested bridges but on the 25th May, Venice was eerily empty. We saw it as very few people have ever seen it. We even walked straight into St Mark’s basilica. Normally this time of year tourists wait for hours wrapped in lines around the square.

The last time we were in Venice prior to this had been 15th February 2020 for Carnevale - a traditional two week festival held in February prior to the start of Lent. Though the festival is celebrated all over Italy, Venice is the place to be. The already beautiful, unique historic city on water takes it one notch further, the wonderful costumes and festive atmosphere make this time truly magical.

It was beautiful, but we did have to navigate a lot of tourists to get through to San Marco the main square, 3 million tourists come to Venice each year just within this two week period. 

In 2020 Carnevale was cut short, it was halted on the 23rd February 2020 two days early- just eight days after we had been there as three people in Venice tested positive for Covid-19 and Italy had a total of 133 confirmed cases mostly in the north. As of the date of posting Italy has had 3,464,543 cases and 106,799 deaths. (3) Stunning numbers now but strange to remember at the time we thought the 133 cases were alarming.

Back to May 2020 when after a long lockdown we had some time to explore as 'locals' without the crowds. This time our masks were different. N95 masks.

Here is the view when we arrived.

This is the main arrival spot - the train station, the bus station, the cruise-line ports the start of the water buses and water taxis' Normally this bridge is full of people. Not today only the locals.

We made our way through the narrow streets without meeting many people at all.

San Marco square was where it really hit me - a usually vibrant bustling area. Full of photographers and tourists from all over the world we basically had it reserved for us. In 2008 when we originally came I remember being acutely aware that I could easily lose my then small children in the crowds. Now I have big children and they were easy to spot among the maybe ten others on the square.

Uncrowded we could see everything so clearly. Palazzo Ducale or Doge’s Palace, with its Gothic architecture is one of Venice’s most iconic buildings, it not only housed the Doge’s apartments, but was also the official seat of the government, home to the city’s courtrooms and its jail, was closed but instead of seeing it through a veil of people we got to see its true gothic beauty.

We walked straight into the 11th century, St. Mark’s Basilica is considered one of the prime examples of Byzantine architecture in the world with its opulent marble floors, luminous gold mosaics and its gold reliquaries in the treasury. Usually at least a two hour wait. No photos were allowed there but it truly would have been worth a two hour wait.

The famous Bridge of Sighs above first built in 1600 connected the Palazzo Ducale, and most importantly its interrogation rooms, with the city’s prison which was located directly across the river. A popular local legend also says that lovers, who kiss on a gondola at sunset under the Bridge of Sighs, will be granted eternal love and happiness. No gondolas today.

The bridge below is the one from which everyone takes their Bridge of Sighs photo from as it crosses the canal was empty, unlike three months before at Carnevale when you had to jostle for a good spot to take a photo.

Venice lay empty that day in May 2020, unacknowledged just like it's birthday this year. But Venice has been here for 1,600 years despite all odds, many floods and this is not its first pandemic.   A city built on water, a lagoon, rivers colliding with the ocean, it weathers it all and remains one of the most unique and beautiful oddities of the world.

I consider that day in May 2020 one of my most privileged travel experiences.  I do not underestimate the hardship and tragedy Venice has endured over the last 14 months. I am devastated for the lives lost.  Venice's residents and business owners have suffered are still suffering.  I am however hopeful, as these photos show Venice remains one of the wonders of the world. I am hopeful it can endure and commemorate all those losses with its continued beauty and legacy to those who designed and formed it. I am confident it will bring back the tourists and allow so many people in the future to have their own privileged experience, as it has for 1,600 years.

Below - San Marco Venice in 2009. Grace my daughter 4 Sam my son  2. 

• https://www.theveniceinsider.com/insider-gondoliers-venice/

• https://www.france24.com/en/20200223-italy-cancels-venice-carnival-over-coronavirus-fears 

• https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/