European Adventures:

Switzerland and Northern Italy, 2018-2019

We figured we’d stop for gelato at a specific place (Gelato Alaska) we’d read about that seemed to be located in between the train and our hotel. This ended up taking 45 minutes of walking, though the gelato was good, as the GPS is laggy and you need to read the map extremely carefully to not have to backtrack a bunch, but we made it. We checked in, put down our stuff, went out and got a sausage calzone and a meringue strawberry and some special Italian marshmallows, then headed to St Mark’s and looked around, fed pigeons, and watched the sun set.

We windowshopped a bunch, talked about Venetian glass and masks, and then went to dinner at a little seafood trattoria. They brought a free plate of spaghetti with garlic, parsley, and red pepper flakes to start and then at the end a free dish with a slab of chocolate hazelnut cake, half a dozen local ring-shaped butter cookies, and three shots of grappa (three different varieties, including one made with (or mixed with? Unclear) Nutella). I passed, but Robert tried all of them and drank maybe half the Nutella one. In the middle, we ordered octopus salad, spaghetti with shrimps, risotto with mixed seafood, and plain tagliatelle with butter and cheese.

Venice also has some towers and as we were walking around, I said “Oh hey, look, we climbed a tower like that!” and Samantha said proudly “yes! It’s like we just go walking around looking for a tower and then we say ‘hey let’s climb this!’” Apparently, even within eight hours, the tower climb was recast as Epic Adventure rather than Hellish Ordeal—that’s our kind of vacation.

That night both Marcus and Helen came down with a stomach virus. We spent the next day trying to get Marcus (who seemed basically fine in the morning) to eat lightly and be gentle to his stomach, but Helen was a lost cause, and was sick the entire day and the following night.

We took a private kids’ tour of the waterfront area over near the historic ship-building area (Arsenal) and its surrounding neighborhood (very local, no tourists, some old greenhouses and gardens turned into cafes and art studios in addition to selling plants). The guide was very nice, clearly used to working with and talking to kids, and she gave Samantha a clipboard with clues and Marcus a clipboard with a map. When he found the next numbered location on the map, Samantha would read out the clue and they’d solve it. Among other exciting details, we looked at a picture of a painting by Canaletto from the same point of view where he painted it, and traced the differences between the painting and today’s reality; we learned about the Greek lion statue that Venice stole from Greece (after the Vikings had conquered the Greeks and tattooed their ships’ captains’ names in the shape of a lindwurm on the lion!); and we walked up the widest street in all of Venice, which had been a canal until Napoleon came in, conquered the city, and decided to fill in that canal. (Below: that widest street, and a more typical narrow Venetian way.)

This all involved walking about a mile in all, up and down a few streets, and answering some questions and hypothesizing about some things. Then we went back to the greenhouse where the kids got to paint and decorate Venetian style carnival masks (already made in papier mage in various styles and sizes—first they learned the names of them all, the Gnana (cat), Medico Della Peste (plague doctor), Zanni/Gianni. Samantha chose the Gianni. In Carnival by Candlelight (The Magic Treehouse book set in Venice that she read last year), two of the characters wear this kind of mask, so she was pretty intent. When each kid had chosen one, the guide/art teacher supervised the painting and decoration process. Each of our kids (surprise!) had their own strong opinions about how their masks should look, and went about it their own way. Samantha did her mask entirely herself except for help with the glue gun for the feather and fabric trimming. Marcus did his entirely himself and refused to use anything but paint—no trim, feathers, rhinestones, etc.— but he painted the details over and over, blacking them out, using the hair dryer to dry it, then using his accent colors again, about a dozen times until he got them exactly as he wanted them. Helen wanted a baby blue cat with green and gold glitter and green whiskers and was very specific about where she wanted the glitter of course—she painted the mask shades of blue mixed with white, and she painted the glue on with a brush. I filled in the paint on the tricky parts (edges, eye sockets) just to cover all the newsprint and I applied pinches of the glitter and the trimming for whiskers to the spaces she’d painted on the glue.

Everyone loved the workshop, and then we walked to Corte Sconta, an “inventive seafood” place, as it’s usually described, for lunch. The food was amazing! The appetizer assortment ($52 euros for 2-3 people) had spider crab mousse on crostini, raw swordfish with a grapefruit and pomegranate marinade, baby clams steamed in wine broth, steamed spider crab with olive oil and lemon juice, raw tuna with a balsamic glaze, langostinos, baby squids, cuttlefish roe, and salt fish cod mouse on polenta. Then we split a sautéed monkfish fillet in sun choke sauce with baby artichokes, and a fried whole squid stuffed with herbs and risotto. The kids had tagliatelle and ate whatever of ours they wanted—just a bite here and there for Samantha and really quite a lot for Marcus (he loved the raw swordfish, baby clams, and the baby artichokes most of all—so much for eating light). Helen didn’t feel well at the meal, but spent most of it sleeping, which was good.

After lunch Marcus came with Helen and me and read the map and navigated us back to the hotel while Robert and Samantha went back to St. Mark’s to go into the Basilica (it had been closed the previous afternoon when we were in the square, and as she was using her special kids’ guide to Venice, where you could earn points for different experiences, she wanted to see the horses up close.

For dinner we went to a simple restaurant super close to our hotel (just one bridge and three turns) so I could run home with Helen if need be. Robert and the big kids got Italian-style hot chocolates at another place afterward before bed.

After the kids went to bed, Robert went out to a supermarket to bring back bottled water, Kinder Eggs, and fresh ricotta and olives, since we have a refrigerator in our room.

The next day, it was Robert’s birthday, and thankfully everyone seemed to be feeling better—we took a vaporetto (water bus) to the island of Murano this morning to watch glass blowing demonstrations and buy small gifts for folks back home. We walked around and looked at many places and finally got a pendant for Robert’s mother, a small picture frame for my co-author/collaborator from school, and a small Christmas tree that can stand up on its own (all glass, obviously) for my mother.

We had lunch on the island at a place frequented by local construction workers, including a beautiful pea risotto and some lovely fat white beans, and sardines, and a beef with gravy, and then took the vaporetto back to the main part of Venice. There we walked back to St. Mark’s Square to meet the art teacher/tour guide from yesterday again. We took a water taxi with her and she directed the driver where to stop, and we rode almost the whole length of the grand canal and then back a bit.

We saw the palace they call Desdemona’s palace, and which they say belonged to the Venetian nobles whom Shakespeare may have based Othello and Desdemona on; we saw the unfinished palace that was bought by Peggy Guggenheim and turned into a modern art museum; we rode under the Rialto bridge; we saw the doge’s summer/second palace; and we heard various other legends of Venice. All of this was couched in the form of a game imagining the kids were a family of nobles trying to build a palace and figuring out everything they’d need and how to get it—like what would they trade to the doge for permission to build, etc. It was very peaceful—Helen slept, and Marcus and Samantha collaborated on the game.

We got off the boat at a campo (square) near the Rialto bridge but a very quiet, hidden one, with great views and not a lot of people. The guide/teacher set up a sketching area and watercolors and the kids started sketching the palaces in view. Samantha had a fantastic time—it was brisk out, but not freezing (maybe 42).

Marcus gave up soon and he and Robert walked to go get hot chocolate and bring it back but everyone enjoyed themselves; we stayed until the sun was setting. From there we went back to our hotel and then out to dinner a bit later to another nice place. We had bar snacks of two different kinds of anchovies (Marcus and Robert adore them) and a smoked salmon crostini, then two antipasti (grilled octopus on a chickpea cake, and beautiful fat shrimp in vinegar on polenta made black from cuttlefish ink), then pasta (a plain plate shared among the girls, bigoli alla salsa for Marcus—a sauce made of onions and anchovies cooked together until it’s a paste, and bigoli with a tomato-Beef cheek sauce for me) and liver and onion soup Venetian-style over polenta for Robert. I asked them to do something special for Robert’s birthday, so when we ordered a chocolate fondant cake and a tiramisu, they also brought a cute chocolate chip cookie cake with a candle in it and we got to sing to him. I think he had a nice meal and a nice day—AND no one threw up! (Below: some of the many doorbells in Venice, which all look like funny faces.)

The 6th of January was a Sunday this year—the 12th day of Christmas, Three Kings Day, Epiphany, or La Befana Day, whatever you’d like to call it. We had breakfast at the hotel and went to the Rialto bridge area for the La Befana day races. It was great fun to watch even though it was crowded—five older male gondoliers dressed up as La Befana, the old woman who supposedly refused to go with the three kings and is still looking for Jesus and gives kids gifts on Epiphania day instead.

They raced their boats, with a huge crowd watching along the sides of the Grand Canal, and announcers in Italian giving play-by-plays. There was free hot chocolate and mulled wine and candy and fried crackers on the side of the canal, and a big Epiphany stocking hanging from the Rialto bridge to be extra festive. Then we had pizza for lunch and went to the top of the campanile in St. Mark’s square (by elevator this time!!) and fed the pigeons again.

To my surprise, a pigeon decided she really wanted to stop on my head, and while I was still processing this, another pigeon sat on Helen’s head. Oh my goodness! I sort of flapped my arms and super casually (frantically, on the inside…) spun in circles trying to get the birds off. Helen was a bit intrigued byt a bit displeased. Afterward we got gelato and bought clementines and a few additional things at a supermarket and came back to the hotel for a brief rest.

Samantha had been making steady progress toward her challenges in the kids’ guide to Venice. She earned 10 points for spotting winged lions and then 1 extra point per lion over the first 50, 3 points for taking a picture of yourself on the Rialto bridge, 3 points for feeding the pigeons in St. Mark’s (hence why I was in a situation where a bird landed on my head—though neither Helen nor I had any actual food for it!), 3 points for trying espresso, 5 points for describing what a pasticceria is and what you did in one, etc. She had been very serious about it, and pulled it out at every meal to update it. The book is careful to say that the adult with you is the official scorekeeper and can override anything the book says, has the last word on things, etc.—the book suggests that at 40 points you get an edible Italian treat, 80 points a small souvenir, 120 points get to choose the next outing, and we got some Italian meringue candies in the shape of giant strawberries for the treat and a little 1 euro magnet in the shape ornament a Venetian mask for the souvenir, and she adores the entire system. She hated the espresso, but I love that picture of her trying it—happy coffee drinker, to all appearances!

After an hour of downtime in the room we went back out to walk over to the Jewish ghetto. I didn’t know that Napoleon had liberated Venice’s Jewish population and opened the ghettos in 1797 when he invaded—that was very interesting. We took a route there that took us over a bunch of streets we’d never been on before, including a new-to-us bridge that famously has no railings. Before we got there, though, we walked past an Epiphany celebration at the local church just around the corner from our hotel. I was suspicious that it might be happening, because it was a Sunday and Epiphany and because when we were going back to the hotel we saw a priest moving a manger into the courtyard outside the church door. Then as we were getting ready to leave the hotel I heard a man say in what sounded like a megaphone “okay now, children, let’s go!” (in Italian, obviously) and told Samantha “hey, let’s go see what’s going on over here.” I figured Robert (doing that European thing of returning our room key to the front desk with Marcus, upon leaving the room) would figure it out and catch up. So Samantha and Helen and I found ourselves in a crowd of parishioners outside the church, with an adult Mary and Joseph and a baby Jesus in the manger area, a priest with a microphone directing things, and two guys with guitars.

There were adult kings in costume and the kids were mostly dressed as sheep and shepherds, though there were a few not in costume too. Some Italian women grabbed Samantha and propelled her into a spot among children her height and smaller, so she could watch the pageant, and the women shifted around and nudged each other to make a space for Helen to see through the crowd and watch too. I could basically understand what the priest was saying (context, plus Spanish and French and Latin all helped of course) and Samantha knows the Christmas story so she was following along.

Eventually, a panting Marcus tugged at my jacket and said “there you are! Daddy didn’t know where you were and said to tell you you’re going in the wrong direction.” I hoped Marcus and Robert knew I didn’t care about “wrong direction” at the moment, because really, this is why we travel, this just stumbling on people in a neighborhood doing their own thing and letting us observe and participate for a moment. Apparently Marcus managed to relay the message and then he and Robert joined to watch the end of the pageant. The men with guitars led everyone singing many verses of (apparently) a peppy Christmas carol, with verses about the baby and the star, and everyone knew all of them and Sang along. Samantha and I were singing “la la la” with the tune (very simple and catchy and singable) by the 3rd or so verse. It might have been “Tu Scende Dalle Strella,” from asking Italian friends after the fact and trying to cross-reference things, or then again it might not have, and it might have been a less well-known carol that was just popular in that particular congregation.

At any rate, it was all a lot of fun. At the end the priest explained that Mary and Joseph would now give gifts to the children and everyone cheered, and then (in Italian) he laid out this careful scheme: if you are under four come up first, everyone don’t come up at once, then if you are 4-7 come up next, then if you are over 7 come up last, don’t worry, there’s plenty of gifts for everyone. He led everyone in the Lord’s Prayer which I joined in in English and told Samantha and Marcus (now next to me) that that’s what was going on. They were somewhat mind-boggled to realize that I was saying in English what the people around me were reciting in another language.

At the end of the prayer everyone say “Amen!” and then, somewhat predictably, there was a mad rush of kids on the manger, with the priest’s neat system abandoned. Marcus figured out what was going on now right away and joined in, and women again pushed Samantha forward, and I moved forward—once the littlest kids were done—with Helen too for her to get one. They were big bags of hand-packed assorted Italian candy, marshmallows and chocolates and lollipops and gummies, all different flavors and brands than any they’d seen before, and they delighted my children for the walk to the Jewish quarter. We were so happy to celebrate Epiphany this way and were very grateful to the little congregation for including us.

We walked around, and then had another fantastic dinner, this time with more seafood, more bigoli pasta, and fried stuffed olives.

On our  last morning in Venice, we had breakfast at the hotel and then went out and stopped at a couple bakeries, getting arrancini and cannoli and marzipan  and other things to supplement it. We also watched the neighborhood scurry to the trash barge which apparently docks in the canal in a specific spot for half an hour and everyone  brings their household trash there before it moves on. Then we got packed up and checked out and went to the train station.

Robert wanted more gelato but the big kids weren’t into it (he is despairing and feels like a failure as a parent) but he got it anyway (Helen loved it). Goodbye, Venice! Robert and Samantha for separate reasons (respectively, global warming and The Magic Treehouse) had both desperately wanted to see it, and I don't think any of us were disappointed.

more. . . .

 

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Created: 1/9/19. Last Modified: 2/25/19.