The difference between bike riding in Ferrara
and in Holland
is, I think, speed. It’s too hot here to ride too fast, so people are a little
more laid back about it. The Dutchies, on the other
hand, ride with furious intent. The Ferrarese are
also laid back about the road rules, so you can ride up the one way street the
wrong way, you can cross the road, as far as I can see, willynilly, and cars will slow down. Well, it’s like that
in New York
too, (except that cars are less likely to slow down!); all those delivery bike
riders all over the place. There’s something very appealing about this level of
lawlessness. We seem to have adapted to it very well, no doubt at our peril.
We took ourselves off to Venice for an overnighter, feeling very proud
of our minimal luggage, vowing to each other that we will, from today, always
travel this way. We rode our deadly treadlies to the
train station, tied them up overnight and took the 1 ½ hour train ride to
Venice; only about 6 Euros, actually one of the few bargains to be had in
Italy, air conditioning thrown in.
Did you know that Venice
is a city on islands. How cool is that? So there’s
water water everywhere….Our hotel was on the island
of Lido, a long skinny island which reminded Terrell of Glenelg,
and me of Noosa. It took a while to find it, and it
was hot. We rented bikes for an hour, suffering bike withdrawals, and road to
the camping (no, that’s not a typo, that’s what they say here in Europe…the “camping”,
not the “camping ground”!) on the southern tip of Lido
for a cappuccino. Coffee in Italy
is wonderful and you don’t need a bank loan to pay for it.
The water buses in Venice
are fantastic, you can buy a pass for 24 hours, and
just hop on hop off. If makes a lovely rest between all that(to quote Bren) “old shit”. We saw the
amazing Cathedral of St Mark, supposed to be the most elaborate cathedral in Europe. Just walking through the little alleys in Venice is wonderful, you
don’t need an itinerary.
We saw some really clever glass blowing on the island of Murano. There
are some interesting stories of jealously guarded family secrets; how in
ancient times, you would be seen as a traitor to leave the island with some of
the knowledge; recipes, techniques, passed on through these families.
So here we are back in Ferrara,
two more days of this lovely place, and then we rent a car and drive to Florence. More later!
Technology Coordinator and Computer Teacher at Dalian American International School, 2 Dianchi Road, Golden Pebble Beach, Dealian Development Area 116650 P.R. China
Today working on picture poem links starting around "better" (August 03, 2012). Picture poems are the digital format of work I did as a street artist in New Orleans in the 1970s, as well as New York City, Honolulu, San Francisco and Adelaide South Australia. Follow @neuage