The time is now. For everything.: Venice. On St. Mark's day.

I decided to visit Venice one lazy weekend in April.

It was St. Mark's day that day actually, meaning the city will get very busy during the day.

Takes 6 hours drive over the highway to get there.

Yes. I am a lucky bastard I know :).

Since I know the city would pe packed, decided to be there earliest possible in the morning.

You drive towards Lido di Jesolo, and catch a boat ride to Venice.

Interesting ride it was.

Say Marco.

Polo.

The boat ride was nice, takes 30-40 mins, not sure actually since I lost a track of time.

When we approached Venice, you could see dozens of gondolas getting ready for the celebration.

I really like these photos.

And all that water.

If you visit Venice on San Marco's you should join the crowd and get this flag.

This fiesta is a bit controversial actually.

Apparently Venetian nationalists/autonomists like to gather on 25th of April in front of Doge's palace and they march trough the city.

I came across them late in the afternoon that day.

Though truth to be told, I kind of got the feeling that half of the people there were tourists taking photos of them carrying flags.

The Doge palace is my favorite building in Venice.

That day I decided to stroll around the city, take it easy.

Not much sightseeing I did.

I just took long walks to wherever and ended up at the Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute instead of Church of Madonna dell'Orto.

But it did not matter since everywhere you go in Venice you come across little piazza's or tratoria's.

Gondoliers getting ready for tourists.

Beautiful arches of the Doge's palace.

I could live in this palace.

Would enjoy the views of gondolas.

The canal.

And gondoliers would sing to me in the evening.
I would be ordering all those exaggerating paintings.
Of me or people I think are important to me.
Like this one.

And I would definitely be ordering one like this.

And some others. That I will not show here, of course.

Snap out of it crazy!

Did you know it is considered bad luck if you pass under the arches of the Doge's palace?

A long time ago, on the Ascension day, Doge decided to marry the sea.

He threw a golden ring into the sea, claiming to be the Lord of the sea.

Since then, Venice is known as the Maiden or Bride of the Sea.

The palace is connected to Saint Marc's Basilica.

At night it kind of glows.

Palazzo Ducale.

Looks really nice.

People who visit Venice either like it or hate it.

And many think Piazza San Marco is overrated.

Hello, who are you to judge?

These buildings here are state of the art.

I like modern architecture, would pay to go to see the skyscrapers of Abu Dhabi, but to me - glass and metal are too cold.

I like bright colors, flaunty architecture, marble, gold, painted ceilings.

What I resent to the Venetian authorities is the fact that those silly stands with more silly "souvenirs" are everywhere at your sight, completely ruining the scenery.

There were no pigeons on the Piazza San Marco that day.

If I recall well, there were millions of them...

St. Mark's basilica.

The first St. Mark’s Basilica was built on this spot in the 9th century to house very sacred relics that had been stolen in 828 when merchants from Venice stole the body of St. Mark the Evangelist, one of the four Apostles, from Alexandria, Egypt. According to the legend, they snuck it past the Muslim guards by hiding them under layers of pork in barrels!

A storm almost drowned them and their precious cargo and it’s said that St. Mark himself appeared to the captain and told him to lower the sails and the ship was saved.

The entire story is pictured on the 13th-century mosaic above the left door as you enter the basilica.

There are more than 85,000 square feet (or 8,000 square meters) of mosaic in St. Mark’s Basilica and more than 500 columns and capitals in the basilica.

The Fourth Crusade shipped a lot of treasure to St. Mark’s Basilica including the four bronze horses, icon of the Madonna Nicopeia, enamels of the Golden Altar-piece, relics, crosses, chalices, and patens.

The Pala d’Oro, a Byzantine altar screen of gold is studded with 1,300 pearls, 300 emeralds, 300 sapphires, 400 garnets, 100 amethysts, plus rubies and topazes.

Too bad my camera could not snap all these details.

If you want to go inside, do be patient.

Lines take more than hour waiting for each of the attractions on San Marco's piazza.

Well, that day they did.

Piazza San Marco is balancing over the water.

When it is flooded it looks like this.

That is the reason why you have these bench looking things all over Venice.To walk over them in case of flooding.

Well, it was not flooded that day.

But crowded with people it was.

Decided to stay here for a while and then I moved on to my favorite piazza behind the Rialto bridge.

I snapped some really nice shots there,

take a look of my other Venice posts if you have time.

The 323-foot (98.6-meter) campanile of St. Mark’s dates back to the 9th century but it had to be rebuilt in 1903 because collapsed! Though it had been reworked in the 16th century, apparently not that well. Safetz standards are improved and now you can go inside.

The price is 8 EUR per person, or 4 EUR if you go in with a group of 20 people.