After checking out the Basilica and the Duomo, and enjoying a most excellent lunch, we visited the Civic Museum. Which was somewhat air conditioned, had a nice collection of medieval Christian art, and was not at all crowded, despite the sweaty hordes just outside. Whenever we travel, we always try to hit the city museums. For some reason, they never attract a lot of visitors, but often have an interesting variety of stuff to look at. Great for short attention spans (like mine).

We spent the rest of the afternoon just wandering around and poking into various alleys and churches. Once you get off the beaten path, Venice is not very crowded, even at the height of tourist season. There was a stop for gelato of course! And a diversion into a purse store. The new rule is that every time we go to Italy I get a purse  🙂

I took a ridiculous number of photos. It is practically impossible to take a bad photo in Venice. I kept thinking, ooh, I want to paint that!

We wrapped up the day by getting ripped off at a canalside bar. We asked for two large beers, expecting the half-liters that are the usual size in Europe. Um, no. Instead we got two LITERS of beer at a price that you don’t even want to know about. I couldn’t come close to finishing mine—at least not if I wanted to be able to walk home. But, the beer was good, the canalside bar was lovely, and we really needed to get off our feet and out of the sun for a while by then. Live and learn. The moral of the story is: always look at the sizes on the menu before you order a beer in Venice!