Third time lucky in Venice - Still Day 1 - Burano!

Approaching Burano

After sunrise at San Marco and breakfast at the Antico Panada, we jumped on the nearest Vaperetto, Number 14, to head out to one of my favourite places on Earth - Burano.  First of all, this was an informed mistake!  In my research, I knew it took 90 minutes to get from San Marco to Burano using this route.  However, it just seemed impossible to be able to locate the Fondemente Nove and catch the Number 12 Vaperetto to go directly there....taking 40 minutes.  Next time?  I know it is worth the walk.  The thing I am not sure of is if this was a result of being there during the off season and routes might work differently at other times.

This route takes you past Lido and then you have to get off the Vaperetto and wait at Punta Sabbioni for the Number 12 to get to Burano, Murano and Torcello.  It was a long 20 minutes, but I did manage to find a coffee shop that was open and used my very limited Italian to buy myself a Cappuccino to go!  This felt like such a waste of time since I had hoped to visit Torcello on the way back from Burano.  Anyway, a tiny Vaperetto arrived to take us to another transfer at Treporti and change to to a normal size Vaperetto and finally..... Burano!  (After leaving using the correct route, I must admit this morning's arrival is spectacular and much more impressive than the more direct approach, so it did have some merit!)

The first stop was a lovely restaurant, Su e Zo, for a courtesy purchase and a trip to the ladies!  Alan and I had the sense to split a fabulous pistachio and chocolate cheesecake with our Cappuccinos.  Then it was onward to enjoy the beauty and the colour of Borano.  The last time we were there, it was raining so I was really excited to be able to enjoy this island without dodging raindrops!

The beauty of being here in midwinter is the lack of tourists and that made this visit even more special.  Alan and I believe we may have walked the entire island either 2 or 3 times and just enjoyed the variety of colour and reflections.

Here are just a few of the photos I took - there are hundreds more!

I had intended to visit the lace museum and also eat the traditional dish served on the island, but in the end, I missed the lace museum and enjoyed Aubergine Parmigiana instead, back at the same place we had the cheesecake!  Beer is so expensive here that I convinced Alan to split a carafe of white wine with me.  I think he enjoyed it!

We also intended to purchase a painting of Burano on Burano. But we never found one we liked so will wait to look back at Venice. We did enjoy the little things we bought...a lace book mark, Christmas ornament, a gorgeous scarf (not lace).  I always carry a big empty handbag when we do these sort of days out so there is ample room to carry whatever we find back to our hotel.

The most exciting purchase still brings a smile to my face though.  Walking along one of the canals, we passed what would be considered a neighbourhood shop and I spotted bottles of water.  We went in and picked up two half litre bottles and were told that would be one Euro.  We did the funniest double take and asked again.  Then I decided it must be one Euro EACH, but it wasn't!  Where we are staying in the most touristy part of Venice, this same size has been seen to cost 5 Euro so you can imagine our surprise!  We do know, especially in Italy, walk away from the most popular areas for anything like that, but this was just such a pleasant surprise.  Here is our friendly shopkeeper sweeping his pavement. I should have taken a photo of the shop though!

When we decided we had exhausted all routes around Burano we thought about eating lunch, but it was after 3 and I just was not ready to try the local dish made with cuttlefish ink.  I do enjoy trying local dishes but that was step too far and I chose something more familiar as mentioned earlier.  Alan also tried a Wurstel and chips instead of his normal pizza for dinner!

We then caught the  Number 12 Vaperetto and arrived back at Venice in 40 minutes as scheduled.

The walk back to the hotel brought another revalation - the Coops have even better priced water at one litre for one Euro!  They were heavy though so only one each.  We never spotted a Coop near San Marco or Rialto Bridge though!

After being on our feet and outdoors most of the day, we collapsed in our hotel room and I felt like I had been in a Boxing Match. But it was too early to stay there so we forced ourselves out and discovered what was kind of an Irish Pub. Why do we always find these?  But it was comfortable and they serve Spritzes only until 9pm.  I learned this the hard way when I wanted a second one and was not able to buy it.  Realising we had missed one meal and it might be a long night, we treated ourselves to chips and they were absolutely perfect!

For the next few days, we kept toying with the idea of returning for early evening....next time that will be a definite!