I’m finally catching up on my ‘logs’. I’m typing this as I
fly back to New York from Venice (this time in the back of the bus on Delta).
But before I get to the Venice part, I have to tell the New York part.
So there we were in Michigan on family vacation (see the Michigan Vacation pics elsewhere) and I get called to work not once, but twice! Darn the luck. The first time was to go to Rome and I talked them into letting me fly right back to Michigan ASAP. The second trip (this one) was supposed to be to Cancun but I got sick and didn’t make it. I wound up on this several days later. In the mean time, they moved me to a downtown Manhattan hotel for a couple days. That was rather nice since there is no food (or anything else for that matter) around the airport hotel.
Well, naturally, I had to go find the jazz. Now this really isn’t hard to do in Manhattan. Some of the best jazz clubs in the world are there. But I didn’t want to spend a fortune. The ‘get in the door’ price starts at about $25 and goes up from there. Joe Sample was at the Blue Note but for (ugh) $40 just to get in. So I got a copy of the Village Voice (the local ‘what’s to do’ paper) and looked on the internet to see what was out there.
I wound up deciding to go to Smalls. It’s a little club on 10th street at 7th avenue. The guy who started it made the same observation I did: it’s way to expensive to go out for a night of jazz. So he decided to try a different approach: he has no staff, offers nothing but soft drinks (and they are self serve), charges $10 at the door and lets everyone stay as long as they want and drink all the juice they care to. Music starts at 10:00 p.m. and goes literally all night. The normal deal is one artist at 10 and midnight, one a 1 and 2 a.m. and a jam session the rest of the night until sunrise (they say 4 a.m. to 8 a.m. but then at the club they said 3 a.m. to 7 a.m. so who knows).
The first act was trumpeter Joe Magnarelli in a quartet with Joel Weiskopf
(p), John Webber (b), and Tony Reedus on drums. For $10 I got my
money's worth right there. You can find any of those guys easily
on the internet. Tony sounded great, as you would expect with credits
like his. Then was the Ned Goold trio. Ned is on Harry Connick
Jr.'s Come By Me CD and tours with him (or did anyway). He had a
bass player (whose name I didn't catch) and drummer Rodney Green.
Stylistically, they alternated between out and in. I could have lived
without entire 'tuneless' tunes, but the fact that they could turn around
and play nice melodies was impressive. Most impressive, though was
Rodney. I didn't get to hear him *really* play but what I heard was
really impressive. For a 'new guy' (I'm guessing he's in his early
20's) he has it all together. I wound up wearing out (it was 2:00
a.m. when the first Ned set ended) so I went home before it was all over.
When I left the place was still full and that's on a Thursday night.
The rest of my New York layover was relatively uneventful (lots of walking, a little eating, some laundry, etc.), so onward to the Venice stuff. Marcella, the gal sitting next to me here on the airplane was kind enough to help out with some of the names of places in Venice so my captions and this story will be more complete than it would have been without her help.
We flew almost 400 people over from New York for a Holland America cruise. Indeed, there were at least 5 huge cruise ships that I counted around the island (plus many smaller yachts and what not). After we arrived (early in the morning) we napped and met in the lobby for a 1:00 p.m. excursion. The group I went with wound up being the cockpit crew (Bill, the Captain, and Rich, the other F/O) plus two flight attendants, Victoria and Helen. Bill bailed on us when it was time for the gondola ride but the other 4 of us were together for the entire day.
The guy at the front desk of our hotel was kind enough to explain how we could get to the island of Venice (the hotel was located on the main land) and even gave us maps. We bought the ‘all day pass’ which included unlimited rides on the busses and water taxies for around $8. We got on the bus and rode out to the island drop off point which is on the opposite side of the island from the main attraction, San Marco’s Square. From there we got on the water taxi and made our way around the island to the station right at the square.
San Marco’s Square is a large Square featuring the “Palazzo Ducale” (Ducale Palace), Campanile (bell tower), and San Marco’s Cathedral. Opposite the Palace is the prison with a canal between the two. The bridge connecting them was the prisoner’s last view of Venice before going to execution. Fun eh? And to think people get a kick out of riding gondola’s under it. Yeesh.
San Marco’s Cathedral is absolutely beautiful. I’ve been in many
cathedrals all over the world and this one is one of the most stunning.
It began in 1000 years ago (yes, exactly, in 1001) and construction on
this building began shortly thereafter (sometime in the mid 1000’s).
It is highly colorful on the outside which is unusual at least in Northern
Europe (this is my first trip to Southern Europe). We got to go inside
and it’s even more beautiful on the inside. The ceilings are colorful,
gold highlighted mosaics depicting various biblical scenes.
