Piano Rialzato, Venice, 6th May 2004
The day started with patches blue breaking the overcast sky and promising better things. By quarter past eight, when I went to buy bread and a melon in the Campo Santa Margherita, the sun bathed the awakening stalls in bright low light casting deep shadows. After breakfast the market was fully alive and we bought sole and shrimps there for our evening meal. Fish safely in the fridge and day bags packed, we set out for Burano.
The Line 1 vaporetto took us up the Grand Canal from Ca’ Rezzonico to Ca’ d’Oro where we alighted and strolled through Cannaregio to Fondamanta Nove. Artists at their easels, brought out by the sun, tried to catch Venetian light and colour along the Fondamenta Santa Caterina.
Going to Burano is not just a matter of getting from A to B, it’s a partial tour of the lagoon. First, a short hop to the cemetery island of San Michele, romantic resting place of Ezra Pound, Sergi Diaghilev and Igor Stravinsky and destination for matrons in black carrying flowers. Next, as the towers and spires of Venice merged into a signature skyline, Murano: a centre for glass making since 1291 and the magnet for most of our fellow passengers, ready to be seduced by the dubious quality of its garish modern creations. Beyond it we were out into the open lagoon, carving a wake between the navigation markers and bouncing on the wash of passing boats. We sat in the stern, open to the air and spray, and relaxed into the freshness after the sticky closure of Venice’s narrow calle. In the distance, across water bothered by a light breeze, two landmarks emerged: the precariously tilting tower of San Martino on Burano and beyond it the slender campanile of Torcello. Then our penultimate stop, Mazzorbo – a charming canal and an island of orchards and gardens.
Burano felt like a toy town, a child’s play-thing after the beauty and sophistication of Venice. Compact, small in scale, jumbled and painted it had a self-conscious picturesqueness. With endless photo opportunities and acres of lace (little of it now made there), it seemed to exist to fill tourists’ time and part them from their money.
Black skies riven by lightening hung over Marcom Polo Airport on our way back.