The flight to Milan had been
uneventful. The next two weeks had been very eventful. The weather and the
sights were fantastic. All over Italy by coach from the north at Pisa and
Florence and onwards to the south via Rome as far as Capri and the Amalfi Coast
then northwards up through central Italy. The weather had been fabulous for
nearly two weeks, but towards the very end of the holiday as we approached
Venice, the weather started closing in. We were going home in a couple of days so
it wasn't too disappointing, almost allowing us to refamiliarise ourselves with
our expected weather patterns back home.
That
evening, the coach driver took us all into Venice and we spent a while getting used
to the canal buses and finding our way around. It hadn't started to rain yet,
though it was threatening to do so. The air was still warm and it was really
quite a pleasant evening. We arrived back at our hotel very tired, ready for
our last full day in Italy. When we awoke we were greeted by the torrential
downpour that had threatened the evening before. We packed our bags in the
gloom and it did give a feeling of disappointment as we settled down to maybe
watch the Grand Prix on television as something to do later that afternoon.
Philippe, our courier, being as optimistic as ever, suggested that our coach
driver take into Venice those of us who wanted to go instead of doing nothing
in a particular on that last day. A group of about ten of us decided to take up
the offer and the hotel management lent us some wet weather plastic raincoats
and umbrellas. It seemed that the weather may not have been particularly
unusual. We set out for the short trip into Venice wondering what we might do
when we got there.
We
arrived mid-morning in the pouring rain and walked the short distance from
where the coach had parked to a canal bus pick-up stop. We must have boarded
the wrong bus as we were taken into an unfamiliar area. The six of us in our
group decided to get off the bus before we ended up too deep in a less busy
part of Venice. The canals and back streets had begun to take on a sinister
appearance in the gloom and I thought of Daphne Du Maurier's book "Don't
Look Now". Everything was wet. Did I see a small hooded red raincoat?
Spooky.
Fortunately,
we had a local street map and after a period of study, began to understand
where we had gone wrong and probably where we were quite some way from the
centre of Venice and in pouring rain. We started walking through the back
streets and alleyways of Venice. We eventually reached the Rialto Bridge and
were encouraged that we were moving in the right direction. We had reached this
place without needing to cross over a canal at all, just going around the left
or right turn at the end of a path. The group split up and we went on our ways.
The
rain began to stop and blue sky showed itself occasionally behind the
cotton-wool looking large white cumulus clouds. Throughout the morning, the wet
ground steamed as the water evaporated in the growing heat of an Italian summer
afternoon. We had walked into an area of Venice on a main canal and crowds were
beginning to form. We had no idea what was happening and imagined it was just
another busy afternoon in Venice in the summer when people came out to enjoy
the weekend. Then things began to happen as the weather began to change quite
suddenly. We became aware of a growing number of unusually large gondolas as we
spied them through the spaces between the ever increasing number of people.
It
turned out to be the most exciting and memorable day imaginable from the
depressing and gloomy start and transforming into a brilliant spectacle before
our eyes. It was going to be a carnival on the canal! We sat on the edge of a
canal somewhere in Venice amongst hundreds of local people all watching this
procession of gondolas of all shapes and sizes filled with Italians dressed in
the most beautiful and brightly coloured costumes of reds, purples, blues and
yellows. On that glorious afternoon, the pageantry and colour was truly
wonderful. The crowds of local people all chattering away in Italian made the
original sinister day a really warm occasion on that sunny afternoon. A real
carnival on the canals of Venice and we were actually there on that one day of
the year that it all happened.
On the
day of our flight home, the sun shone on us once again. The entire group had
been ushered to the wrong departure gate at the airport and the monitor showed
us lining up to go to Manchester. A long way from Gatwick airport near London!
The error was corrected and the trip from Marco Polo airport was then
uneventful. We didn't talk much about our fabulous day in Venice as most of the
people on our plane hadn't experienced the spectacle. We reached our destination
safely with our memorable holiday complete.
Right
up to that last sunny day.
© Mark Glanfield 2005