The Grand Canal by Alan Crossan

Laura and I gaze out from the side of the vaporetto, past a flustered Venetian pensioner dressed all in black, her hair in contrast a brilliant white. Her weekly shopping bags in danger of being trampled underfoot by the herd of tourists stampeding down the ferry gangplank. A flurry of what I assume are Italian expletives follow. How she must long for the quieter months when the hordes climb back aboard their cruise ships and she is able to sit in peace on her journey home. Her aged eyes have grown used to the view, to her it is common place. How long must it have been since she looked on these buildings with the sense of wonder I am experiencing?
 
Gothic palaces, patches of brickwork showing through plaster, slowly crumbling into the opaque green waters of the canal. Cracked and lined, the public facades of the palaces, like the pensioners face, show their years of experience. Under their watchful gaze dukedoms, countries and empires have risen, only to fall back with the waves.
 
Gondolas and other small boats weave around the vaporetto somehow narrowly avoiding catastrophe. Gondoliers: equal parts tourist guides, serenaders and lewd comedians. Dressed in their uniform of striped shirts and ribboned hats, centuries of knowledge utilised in their masterful navigation of the channels. Communicating with each other in a private language over the heads of romantic tourists.
 
We disembark at Rialto Mercato, almost immediately plunging into a seething mass of market stalls, a festival of noise and colour. Pushing our way through the crowds as they mingle around. Stalls selling Murano glass moulded into ornamental animals or flowers. Stalls selling pasta of all shapes and sizes. Huge crates piled up full of bananas, melons, apples, tomatoes and many other varieties of fruit besides. The competitive calls of market traders echoing back and forth around the square. Beyond the fruit market, a covered area. Empty now but it's use clear, for despite being given a thorough hosing down, the pungent aroma of fish still lingers.
 
All this drama surrounds us but nothing at this stage that even vaguely resembles a hotel. I fan open the creased A4 providing directions - "Leave ferry at Rialto, take a left, then next right. Cross the square and you will find us at far side" - We've followed them to the letter but the hotel remains hidden. Spotting a passage at the far side of the square, we decide to follow it, confident the hotel must be close at hand.
 
Wandering over arches with gondolas sailing under. Stumbling upon a campo, an open space triumphant over the constraints imposed by a labyrinthine city. Holy shrines preserved within hollowed walls, Madonna and child with wilting flowers laid. Lost among dark alleyways and bridges crossing backwater canals with the late afternoon sun beating down, sweat dripping from furrowed brow, stinging my eyes. The heat is intolerable, but nothing compared to the rage boiling within me. It's clearly the hotel's fault, providing such shoddy instructions. I've no idea if we are even close to where we should be. The maze leaves me defeated, complaining bitterly.
 
Asking for directions isn't doing me any good. My increasingly frantic jabs at the paper met with polite indifference and a shrug of the shoulders. Thoughts cross my mind of the two of us sleeping
rough on our first night in Venice, with only suitcases for pillows.
 
Time is dragging on and with the shadows lengthening, to my mind, everything takes on a sinister air. A small woman in a red hood ambling down an alley ahead, grotesque masks hanging in shop windows: eye holes staring vacantly, judging our every step. Then the full horror of realisation hits. A fresh look at the vaporetto route map in our guide book reveals something vital I had somehow managed to miss, a stop called Rialto, a further one on from Rialto Mercato. All this time in our confusion we have been exploring the wrong side of the canal.
 
A weary army, we force march our way back to Rialto bridge for one last push, our objective which had seemed so elusive now apparently within reach. Trundling our cases over steps worn by the feet of many a weary traveller, by merchants, poets, artists and artisans, for us Venice has lost its allure. Crabbit, exhausted and embarrassed, shoulders slumped and heads bowed, we reach the top of the bridge.
 
It's here that Venice provides one final surprise. We look down the now quiet Grand Canal into a glorious sunset, the last of the sun's rays turning the water a glittering gold, palaces and churches lit from below by spotlights. A view of such breathtaking beauty that I knew in that moment our trip would give us all we had hoped for. The floating city had recaptured its magic.