Calle dei Frati, Noon Today

Bottoms Up on the Grand Canal, This Afternoon

A capsized kayaker is towed to safety by a passing group of rowers with a small outboard motor on their boat

The 43rd Vogalonga, a non-competitive 30 km row around the Venetian lagoon, takes place tomorrow, but the rowers were already out in force today. Initiated as a distinctly local reassertion of the importance of traditional Venetian oar-powered boats and an objection to the motorboat waves that were battering the foundations of the city, the Vogalonga has become an international celebration of the oar, with participants coming from far and wide and taking to the water in all styles of boats (as you can see in images from previous year's editions: 2016, 2015, 2014, and 2013).

Various types of rowed boats passed up and down the Grand Canal all day today, multi-person crews and single and double kayakers, all of them looking adept, as you'd expect of anyone about to undertake an outing of tomorrow's length. But traffic on the Grand Canal can create difficulties for even more experienced rowers, as became evident when a kayaker found himself upended by the wake of a passing vaporetto in the center of the Grand Canal.

Fortunately, at that moment traffic in that part of the canal was sparse and the kayaker was quickly towed by a passing crew to the safe port, or rather, portico, of Ca' D'Oro. If it had been a work day, or even a typical Saturday afternoon (as today is part of the extended holiday of the Festa della Republica), the kayaker could easily have found himself in much more trouble.

The city has implemented regulations forbidding the use of kayaks, standup paddle boards, canoes, and dragon boats in the canals and most rii (small side canals) from 8 am to 3 pm on weekdays and from 8 am to 1 pm on Saturdays. A wise decision, I think, based upon what I personally witnessed in the days when a kayak rental outfit right near the Rialto Bridge was renting kayaks to absolutely anyone--including rank beginners--and sending them out into the waterways with a useless water-proof map.

This afternoon provided yet another reminder, of the sort that periodically occurs here, that Venice is not a theme park or play land: something that both visitors and city officials would do well to keep in mind.

Ca' D'Oro must qualify as one of the world's most beautiful boat houses

Disrobing in the historic center, much less in one of the city's great buildings, is generally looked down upon by Venetians--but that rarely seems to stop visitors

Still Water

In keeping with my blog post of 25 May....

Palazzo Ducale Loggia, This Evening

Some Reflections on Venetian Reflections

A rare unruffled view of one of the city's famous sites, the church of I Frari

Still waters almost never run deep in Venice. This is not intended as a metaphor about its residents but as a simple, literal statement about its canals.

The canals that are deep here, such the Grand Canal and the Giudecca Canal, are never still; and those side canals (or rii, actually) that are sometimes still, are never deep. But what strikes me lately is how rarely even those side canals are actually still. They're almost always rippled at least a bit by the tide coming in or going out, by a breeze, by a gondola or small motor boat, or battered (along with the ancient foundations of canal-side buildings) by a mototopo (work boat) or water taxi.

On the very rare occasions when the water really is still you get a view of the city that differs as greatly from the ordinary as the city in daylight differs from your perception of it at night, or in winter from summer. On any given day, in any season, you can take up your favorite position in the city and watch your view change with the changing light. This transformation, effected only by light, is one of the most celebrated in the vast literature of Venice.

But, as far as I know, there's no telling when you'll happen upon the perfectly still water in the side canals in which the city is almost perfectly mirrored, with just the slightest changes in detail and color that make the image all the more picturesque, like an old photographic plate. If it's possible to predict such still water by reference to tidal forecasts I'm not aware of how.

And I suppose it's this unpredictability that makes the experience so striking, even when--or especially when--you live here full time. You turn a corner along your usual route and you see something completely different, without even quite knowing what's changed at first. Struck by it, you hope to encounter the same view the next day, and the next, and the next, but the water on those days is rippled, the images wavering or multi-faceted almost beyond recognition--which is nice in itself, but not what you were hoping to find. After a certain point you give up on ever seeing the water just as it was that one time. And perhaps you never do. But in an entirely different part of town, where and when you don't expect it, you happen upon such still water again, and the experience is just a surprising and striking as it was the other time or times. Maybe more so, if you'd given up hope in the mean time.

This, too, is not intended as metaphorical, but feel free to read it however you like.

Late Dinner on the Dock, Grand Canal

A romantic dinner by smartphone light.

Water Door, This Afternoon