En Route to Wien

Boy With Pigeon

I'm writing this post from a hotel in Klagenfurt, Austria, where we are staying for the night as we make our way from Venice to Vienna. Venice was a town certainly unlike any other on earth--a city that by all logic shouldn't even exist, yet has flourished as a center of culture and art for hundreds of years. A port city, you can find architectural influences from the east and the Byzantine empire, as well as the Romanesce influences found throughout Italy. We stayed at a smaller city named Padua (Padova), about a half hour's train ride outside Venice. The first time I walked out of the Venician train station and down the steps, it was like stepping into a whole new world. It feels like you are standing at the edge of a street, yet there is no street, only water. And there are no cars, only boats. No crosswalks, but bridges. It is unreal. I watched a construction crew operate heavy machinery from their boat. I watched a postman zip down the canal in his motorboat. I watched a blue police boat speed by with sirens blaring. Although interesting to watch it was almost unsettling how foreign it all was. In addition, the city is an absolute maze to get around in--nearly impossible to navigate. I wished we had spent a little more time there to get a better feel for the place.

On our last day in Venice we went to the glass-making island of Murano and the lace-making island of Burano. Murano was nice; the glass there was absolutely beautiful (though quite expensive for the larger stuff) and we got to see a demonstration of the glass blowing, which was interesting. Burano, though, was a photographer's dream. Every building on that small island was painted a deep, saturated, solid color. A bright red house next to a deep blue house with red flowers in the middle, next to a dark green store with yellow shutters on the windows. It was wonderful. By the time this gets posted, some pictures of Burano will hopefully be on my Flickr page. The picture I'm posting here was taken in San Marco Square, the social hub of all Venice. With the San Marco Cathedral in the background and Doge's Palace to the left, the square is constantly full of people (Venicians and tourists alike), and there are usually at least two pigeons for every human out there. If you have any bread or seed they will surround you and eat directly from your hand. This young boy was having a great time with the birds; I snapped off a few frames, and was satisfied with this one.

As I said in the last post, I wanted to take more portraits. In Venice, I was able to get some shots of a street clown (who posed quite dramatically for me when I asked if I could take his portrait), a street musician, a lace maker on Burano, and waitress/owner of a wonderful restaurant I ate at on my last night (I had spaghetti with clams, cuttlefish in ink with polenta, fried potatoes, and red wine). I haven't look real hard a post-processing them yet, but I have a feeling none were terribly successful. Still, I know that's what I'd like to do more of; it would take my summer portfolio to an entirely new level.

Tomorrow we head into Vienna, the home of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. I hope to get my fill of sausage, beer, and classical music.