Animated Journeys : Venice and Pisa, Italy

"I don't know where I am going but I'm on my way"

Venice :

Imagine the audacity of building marble palaces on a city of lagoons. The romantic city of Venice is the capital of Northern Italy's Veneto region. It was originally built on more than 100 small islands in a lagoon in the Adriatic sea. Built on mud, sand and slime, the city has stood for centuries with palaces and churches, having a treasure of art and sculpture.

The communication in the city is by cris-crossed waterways and canals. It has no roads, just the canals. The biggest canal is the Grand Canal. Various bridges are seen sitting across the innumerable canals. The most beautiful and famous bridge is the Rialto Bridge which is the oldest one, standing over the Grand Canal. The bridge has been rebuilt many times over the years.

The Grand Canal is the S-shaped main canal and is lined by 50 palazzi and six churches. The St Mark's basilica is at the end of canal. A gondola ride in the waterways is an experience by itself with the expert Gondolier wearing blue or red striped shirt and having long oars, rowing it under numerous bridges with elan. Most of the gondoliers descend from a family of gondoliers and follow the family occupation.

Walking the numerous lanes of Venice and getting lost is an experience by itself. Tiny signage written in Italian are the only help in finding the way out. Shops in some of the lanes give a good bargain to tourists.

A visit to nearby Murano glass factory is an added attraction, showcasing the famous Murano glass works including super grand chandeliers with intricate designs.

Grand Canal

Pisa :

Pisa is an Italian city in the Tuscany region and is well known all over the world for its iconic Leaning Tower. The 185 feet (56 metre) tower when completed in 1372 was already tilting. The tower is actually the bell tower of the adjacent cathederal in the Piazza dei Miracoli. The tower is constructed with white marble. The uneven settling of its foundation became noticeable when three of its eight stories had been completed. At that time a war broke out and the constructed was halted for almost a century. This gave ample time for the foundation to settle and likely prevented its early collapse. When construction resumed an effort was made to compensate for the lean by making the new stories slightly taller on the short side, but the extra weight caused the structure to sink still further. After many interruptions, the tower was ultimately completed in 1372.

In 20th century, as the structure was still subsiding and was in danger of collapse, it was closed to public in 1990. The engineers then undertook a major straightening project which caused some straightening of its tilt and the tower was reopened in May 2001. Engineers now expect the tower to remain stable for at least 200 years. Present tilt is now 3.97 degrees while the worst tilt it got was 5.5 degrees.

Baptistery : Another noticeable building in the complex is the rounded beauty of San Giovani Baptistery. This marble giant is almost as tall as the leaning tower. At 55 meters it is in fact the largest Baptistery in Italy. It has a circumference of more than 100 meters. It is famous for its acoustics.