Autunno a Venezia: Domenica Ancora

Here we are again at the end of another week. It is hard to believe that the time is slipping away like this. Such is always the case when the times are good........and we have really been having an extraordinary stay here. We are still in our slightly slowed down pace of life. We had a nice breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, yogurt and strawberries......and lots of coffee! After that we spent a couple of hours relaxing, painting, checking out things online, and acting in the spririt of a Sunday morning.

Around 11:00 we headed out to visit a photography exhibit on Giudecca in the Tre Oci Museum. The exhibit was the largest show ever assembled for Sabine Weiss. She was a rather remarkable Swiss/French artist who passed away only last year at the age of 97......still working to prepare this retrospective show. For those who have read 'The Correspondents' there are a lot of parallels with her career, although probably about 10 years later than the women in that book. The show was captivating and was worth the visit.

After Tre Oci, we wandered down the fondamenta (Giudecca) and stopped at the cafe we have gone to a couple of times for coffee and a pastry. The nice thing about this cafe is that it is the first to get sun on Guidecca's west side along the water. There is a slight bend in the fondamenta that allows this area to get out of the shadows just before noon. We had a nice break looking out across the Giudecca Canal to Venice proper.......very relaxing. We did a small amount of exploring, but ended up making a wrong turn and stumbled onto the women's prison on the island.......a bit eerie and very quiet.

Back at the ranch we had a homemade late lunch and settled in for the afternoon......painting, reading and napping! Around 5:00 we went for a long walk around the perimeter of the island again. It is truly beautiful in a unique way. This part of the island is covered with mature trees and plantings that are probably quite old and go back to when Giorgio Cini purchased the island. It is not manicured the way it might have been at one time, but it is wonderfully romantic and somewhat unspoiled. We walked for a half an hour and never saw another person. It is our own personal wooded park in Venice. After the walk we headed down to the San Giorgio Cafe for an aperol spritz and an hour of just sitting and watching life go by. It is fascinating to see the people who come to San Giorgio for the exhibits.....and we are continually enthralled by the presence of the marina and 'life on the water.'

We forgot to mention that we were introduced to a group of students from the Columbia University School of Historic Preservation and the Department of Architecture. The two professors leading the group were energized to hear of my research on Palladio and Veronese......and we agreed to meet up again in the next couple of days before we leave. It is nice to have a dozen new people in the Residenza!