Sunday, December 4, 2016

Traversing Four Centuries in a 6 Horsepower Outboard Boat

This image from two years ago gives some idea of the limitations of our makeshift mototopo

I'm afraid I haven't been able to keep up with blogging in recent days because we've been in the process of moving, from the apartment we've lived in at the eastern edge of Venice for all of our 6 years here to a larger apartment not far from the Rialto Market. It's a move from an area of few tourists to an area of many more, yet in the minds of most people we have finally moved to the "real" Venice. The Venice people picture when they think of Venice.

Is it the "real" Venice? It certainly looks like it, and I suppose some people might claim that in Venice of all places looks are really all that matters. But just how "real" it is, and what that curious and usually unreliable (if not outright fraudulent) term might mean is something we'll have to find out.

Our move is actually ongoing, as our contract in our old apartment is also, alas, ongoing for a time, so there was no great single moving day. And as we're moving from one furnished apartment to another we haven't had to worry about all the big items often involved in a move. So we haven't rented or hired a mototopo or large work boat to make our move--as is typical here--but relied so far on our small sandolo sanpierota and its 6 horsepower outboard motor.

Our son, Sandro, needless to say, was disappointed that we didn't at least rent a patana--a medium-sized work boat almost exclusively made of fiberglass these days. But moving is moving, and as he still dreams of founding his own traslochi (moving, transportation) company one day, any disappointment was soon displaced by logistical considerations (pondered in great detail) and action. There was work to be done, and work that required the use of his own personal hand truck or trolley. His birthday present of 3 years ago that he's used so much that one of its rubber tires is disintegrating and needs replacing.

In any case, on a cold first day of December Sandro and I slowly motored a boatload of large, heavy suitcases and boxes from the edge of Venice to its historic center. A journey which, on land and in an automobile, or even in a boat with a decent-sized motor, is of truly negligible distance. But which here in Venice ended up being one of no less than 400 years: from the 20th-century apartment house we'd been living in for the last 6 years to a 16th-century palazzo, one of whose apartments we're now trying to make into our home. Suffice it to say for now that the 20th century is generally warmer....  

9 comments:

  1. Moving, the very mention of this word fill me with dread. Good luck with the move, I'm sure your head of logistics will have it all under control.
    PS We're in Venice for a week at Christmas, would you let me treat you to a Spritz or coffee?

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    1. Thanks, Rob, it's been 6 years since we last had to move, so we really have nothing to complain about and, yes, living with a someone who's devoted his life to such things, even if still quite young, is a help. Or at least puts it in a different perspective. What would seem like a trial to other people seems like paradise to him.

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  2. Best of luck! We look forward to your new adventures near the Rialto!

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    1. Thank you, Helen. I've actually been really surprised by how different things are here so far, so it seems like there'll be different things to write about.

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  3. Best of luck for the move and I hope that the new place will be everything you hoped for.
    Just a question of real curiosity. Can anyone just rent a boat in Venice and start driving around? I suppose I could handle a boat like yours in a small Swedish lake with few other boats around, but in the hustle and bustle of Veince I think I'd be rammed and sink Before I could shriek "Aiutami!".

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    1. Thanks, Andreas, and the answer to your question is that, yes, you can indeed rent a boat here. I'll direct you to my son's favorite website lately, as it allows him to show me just how big a boat we could rent: http://www.brussaisboat.it/en/

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  4. Best wishes in your move! Only in few places like Venezia such a long travel of 400 hundred years can be made in a such small urban space. Sometimes you don't even need to move in space to travel in time. I remember my (let's say) "revelation" when I discovered the sens of deep contradiction but -at the same time- connection beetween action and contemplation in one of the last Bellini's in San Giovanni Crisostomo Church ("Saints Christopher, Jerome and Louis of Toulouse"). This apparent contradiction has accompanied me all my life through. I was 54 when I discovered the deep sens of this beautiful picture. But it was this church the first one I visited in my first travel to Venezia in the 80's. As W. B. Yeats would say (in Branduardi's italian version): "era giovanne e sciocco ed ora non ho che lacrime..."

    Lluís from Catalonia

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  5. Quite a surprise that you change the peaceful Santa Elena for the busy Rialto, but if it's too busy for you, you can always move again. Good luck and hope you enjoy your new home!

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    1. We're lucky in that our new apartment is quite near the Rialto, Jon, but quite off the beaten track as well. It's at the end of two very narrow calli and with a gated court, so there's no foot traffic or noise. Quieter even than Sant' Elena. Thanks for your good wishes--and I don't even want to think about the possibility of moving again!

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