Hot and Cold in Venice

As the water taxi rounded the corner to our drop-off point in Venice, the sun beat down upon the cream, maize and faded pink of palazzos facing the Grand Canal.
In moments, that brilliant midday sun was beating down on our heads, too, as we hauled our weekend bags to the Messner Hotel, near the spectacular Santa Maria della Salute church on Venice's southeast corner.
At 95 degrees, this was a day for the beach, for an air-conditioned nap, for several glasses of something cool in the shade.
We would get none of that.

No, our 55-person group was off to tour the Doge's Palace and the Basilica di San Marco, where tour guides would ply us with rich Venetian history, with spectacular statuary, with a close look at a famous prison just steps from where the Doges lived for centuries.

And out a prison window, through the bars, comes the view of The Bridge of Sighs, that last vista a doomed prisoner might get before being hanged. Say goodbye to family and friends, waving at you from that bridge, then you are dragged to the gallows. (I love you Richard Russo!)
We mopped the sweat from our faces, necks, arms as we went.

It was a metaphor for a weekend in which Mother Nature just got in the way of treasuring a famous city.



Probably didn't help that 50 people in this group were college students on their first weekend in Europe, with World Cup to watch at rowdy Venetian college venues and early calls for tour departures.

But even the locals were done in by the heat and humidity.
"Caldo, si?" the mail carrier said to a heavy, 70ish woman wearing a flowered housedress as they passed on the 1.5 meter-wide canal sidewalk.
"TROPPO caldo," the woman replied, with a long sigh. She shifted a bag of groceries to the other hip and trudged on.
The mail carrier stopped in the shade, took out a stained handkerchief and wiped his forehead, then leaned again the cool stone wall and closed his eyes for a moment.
I couldn't agree more.

Still, it didn't stop some of my students from having fun. Several of the guys pulled out their cameras and hammed it up photographing the glorious butt of a spectacular statue in the Doge's Palace.
Another student played air guitar with a street musician.

For there is Italy to digest, to savor and to surrender to.
Even in the heat of summer.