René’s old blog
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Redentore 2011
The Redentore Feast is one of the major annual celebrations in Venice, and one with a massive local participation. It takes place on the third Sunday of July, and on the evening before there is a huge display of fireworks just before midnight. It usually last around 45 minutes.
I went there with a bunch of friends in an old verigola belonging to the Arcobaleno association, and we got a place in front row, just in front of the Punta della Dogana, with only a few gondolas and sandolos in front of us, which proved a very nice spot for getting some photos of the fireworks.
More photos after the fold ..
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Training in the lagoon
This guy just went up and down a short stretch of lagoon canal behind the Vignole, training in a little corner sheltered from the winds of the day.
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Working boats
Venetian boats at work. There’s a green grocer on a boat behind the gondola, and a topo to the right. Three different uses for boats in Venice.
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Venetian Truck Drivers
This boat is a “topo”, a Venetian truck, with a crew of two. One is steering, almost with the rudder up his behind, the other is sleeping soundly on the fore deck, while they pass a 14th century monastery building and a 17th century church.
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The Naviglio di Brenta
The Naviglio di Brenta is the old part of the river Brenta, which had its estuary in the Lagoon of Venice close to Fusina. After the demise of the city of Torcello in the 11th adn 12th century, the Venetian understood the cause. The river Sile had made a vast delta behind Torcello, causing the […]
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À faire en Italie – Canadian TV
Somehow myself, Steve Lutsch from Canada and my friend Loretta from Venice, end up in a Canadian-French TV programme, called “À faire en Italie – La liste de François-Etienne”.
I’ve only seen this little bit, so I have no idea what kind of figure I cut in the rest of the show.
Dec 2019: the video non longer online.
The link was: https://player.vimeo.com/video/21197150
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Launching from a beach
For almost four years I’ve been doing my kayaking tours of Venice from a camp site on the Lido di Venezia. It has been, and is, in many ways a good launch spot close to Venice, but it is not without its drawbacks. The shore there is a road which is 1-2m over the water […]
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UFO – Unidentified Floating Object
When paddling around Venice we often see slightly weird boats around — different shapes, odd names, alternative behaviour — but the other day I encountered something in a category of its own.
I tried to get a good photo of it, but waterproof point-and-shoot cameras aren’t always that great for taking photographs, so this was the best shot I got.
We have some of the usual mix of boats here. There’s the gondola, the taxi, the cargo boat and a building barge:
Then in the middle there’s this unidentified floating object
It appears to be the workmen from the barge in front of Palazzo Grassi, who got the sudden urge to cross the Canal Grande on a rather busy stretch, using some kind of steel box and shovels for paddles.
They did get across, but I’m not quite sure it qualifies as safe paddling 🙂
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Paddling Planet errors
There are a lot of errors on Paddling Planet recently, mostly HTTP errors 404 (Not Found) and 409 (Conflict), but they all relate to Blogger and change all the time, so I assume the fault is at Blogger.
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Reflections
At the end of the year we’re supposed to reflect on the year that passed. I have found that a bit hard this year, so I’ve decided to leave the reflections to the vaporetto (water bus) platforms of Venice. They do a good job at reflecting 🙂
Santa Maria della Salute
Santa Maria della Salute from the Giglio stop
Palaces on the lower Canal Grande from the Salute stop
San Giorgio Maggiore seen from the S.Marco stop
The Giudecca seen from S.Marco
The Lido seen from S.Zaccharia / S.Marco
San Giorgio Maggiore seen from S. Zaccharia / S. Marco
San Servolo seen from the Giardini stop
The Bacino San Marco seen from the Giardini stop
