Back in October last year Clare & I took a short city break to Venice. I packed only 3 lenses (3 lenses – the 50mm f1.2, the 16-35mm f2.8 & the 24-105mm f4IS) and came back with a bazillion images of a stunning place. It really did live up to the hype. After filed them down and processing some into some colour & some into black & white, I blogged a slideshow of the grainy, clipped black + whites (check out the blog here).
One thing led to another and I didn’t find time to blog the colour pics, which was a shame as Venice is surprisingly colourful, so here are ‘The colours of Venice’!
As opposed to the ‘arty’ B+W collection, these colour pics were more the ‘holiday snaps’ side of the trip, hence this monster selfie.
The view from our hotel wasn’t too bad!
The lovely thing about Venice is that it’s genuinely so easy to wander around. Getting lost is actively encouraged to truly discover the place…
…you just keep crossing the canals and if you get to the edge of the island, turn round and wander on in another direction!
(Though a map did come in helpful sometimes!)
I’ve always wanted to take a pic like this – a long exposure of the Venitian gondola’s bobbling around on sea.
I’d packed my variable ND filter so I could get a super long exposure even in bright conditions, and as I couldn’t be bothered lugging a tripod about, locked the camera in against some railings to keep it steady.
Couldn’t be anywhere else really could it?
The infamous ‘Harry’s Bar’
Love the textures and pastel colours on this one, with the cheeky gondola just disappearing under a bridge to add context.
Clare used to work at Hard Rock cafe and has a bit of residual Hard Rock geek in her that we generally satisfy on city breaks with margaritas and jumbo combo’s
The wedding photographer in me couldn’t help but wonder about the possibilities of shooting a wedding around these amazing streets.
Pretty much every street wherever you are in Venice has a sign that points towards Piazza San Marco, the hub (& major tourist trap) of the city.
A look I’m considering adopting.
After going up the basilica, we headed into the Doges Palace, where the powerful rulers of Venice used to hang out and show off about how rich they were.
As in much of ancient Italy, it was all about the fancy ceilings & murals.
Piazza San Barnaba!
One sunny evening, we settled down with the locals in Campo Santa Margherita for a few of the famous Venitian ‘Aperol spritz’ cocktails
Any drink that looks like Iron Brew is good with me.
A little while later a bottle of prosecco had also bit the dust…
After a slightly dusky start to the trip, we were treated to beautiful blue skies & sunshine! Not bad for October.
Clare’s not a big fan of going up towers!
We base pretty much all our holidays around foodie destinations!
After a few days exploring the main city of Venice itself, it’s worth hopping on a few ferries to the colourful neighbouring islands of Burano & Murano
It’s a nice relaxing ferry away
Murano is still world renowned for it’s glass blowing skills
Burano is just a beautifully colourful fishing village of an island
Another nice place to settle down with an espresso and people watch!
That evening we decided we couldn’t come to Venice and not take a punt around the canals on a gondala, in spite of you needing to take out a mortgage to do so.
It’s certainly a splendidly grand way to take in this amazing city.
If you’re put off by the fact that Venice is a) majorly touristy b) silly expensive and c) smelly, think again. It’s a) so easy to escape the uncreative crowds getting ripped off on St Marks Square, b) apart from the hotel costs, it was surprisingly cheap to eat & get around (again, away from the epicentres) and c) didn’t smell at all in October (though I hear the stagnant water bakes up nice in the heat of the summer).
Get yourselves involved!