Welcome To Venice, Italy!
All of the photos here were taken by my wife and I when we visited Venice in September – a city of incredible beauty – need proof?
The world’s most famous “floating city” is an urban paradise – 160 square miles – but only 3 feet above sea level!
That means when you go into San Marco Square at night, you see pools of water – which make for some incredible reflections…
Venice has more than 150 canals and 400 footbridges – and was built on wooden stilts in the middle of the Venice lagoon – so when you are out on the lagoon you sometimes find places that have been “given back” to the sea:
Venice Is Sinking – But Not Because Of The Water…
All of these pictures highlight the beauty of the city, but underneath this facade is a very big problem that threatens to sink Venice for good.
You may have read many times about the fact that the city is slowly sinking back into the sea, but that’s not the biggest problem facing it right now…here’s what we encountered on our visit:
Venice Is Being Sunk – By People!
Wow, talk about crowded! At every turn we encountered big crowds of tourists, all there for the same reason we were – to walk the streets this city.
You know things are bad when there’s even a “gondola traffic jam!”
You see, FIFTEEN MILLION tourists go to Venice every year – and the weight of their impact on the city has gotten UGLY.
One afternoon we were sitting on a terrace overlooking the entrance to the Grand Canal – an amazing view:
But Then…
As we sat and stared out, I saw something moving – something unusual, oversized, beginning to dwarf the architecture – by the time we got back to sea level, this is what we saw:
Look at the size of that Mega Cruise Ship! We watched as it slowly paraded past San Marco Square before heading off to dock – and it was one of FOUR mega cruise ships we saw arrive in a single day!
This is a far-too-common sight now in Venice, and the locals are rising up against it.
According to a terrific report recently in The Guardian.com:
“Earlier this month an estimated 2,000 Venetians marched against a tourism industry they argue has eroded their quality of life, that is damaging the environment and driving residents away: Venice’s population has fallen from about 175,000 in the post-second world war years to 55,000 today.”
When my wife were there, we were told that many locals can no longer afford the city – and the overwhelming impact of tourists is negative.
As The Guardian’s great reporting revealed, the locals are close to giving up on their great city:
“Luciano Bortot, who was born here, is feeling anything but serene. “You’re asking me what it’s like to live with this crap?” he said. “It used to be wonderful, we had lots of artisans … the problem now is the mass tourism, the people who come for just a few hours and see nothing – it’s as much of a nightmare for them.”
So the impact of tourism has made the city more crowded, more expensive, and more deserted of locals – a bad trend.
Venice is magical in so many ways – so I hope they can come up with solution to the population decline, the sinking city, and the mega cruise ships that are clogging the city and depriving it of life…
If you want to see more of this city, especially at night, you can click on my story here, where there are more pictures of Venice…
We were in Venice to depart on The Simplon-Venice Orient Express Train to Paris, where we saw incredible sights like this:
We literally watched history pass by our window…see more here:
Let know if you’ve seen this mega ships in Venice…
Categories: Books / Media, Exotic Travel, Italy, Memoirs, nature, Pop Culture, Travel, Travel Adventures, Travel Memoir, Uncategorized
johnrieber 
Holy cow! What a way to ruin a magical city. I heard that the water in Venice is actually beginning to clear as people are inside during the Corona virus.
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When I was there, our group stayed at Lido Beach and we taxied into the square. That was nice–I preferred staying at Lido than the center! I’m not a fan of crowds and Venice was just too crowded for me to fully appreciate. Like our National Parks over here, when they get too crowded, you have to have a permit to enter which allow only so many people in. I like the idea because I want to see the world’s glorious places but not at the expense of losing my personal space. A sardine I am not. It’s just not fun.
Get me to the outskirts, and I’ll enter during the off hours. 😉
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That’s why we enjoyed our tour of “secret” Venice, with off-the-beaten-path places that tourists don’t bother to over-run!
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That city seems to be suffering from a tourist situation that has got out of control. It’s a dilemma, as without the tourists, Venice would have little or no industry. Perhaps the cruise ships should drop off their passengers somewhere else, and then they could travel into the city independently. Then there is the ongoing issue of ‘bite-size’ tourism, where some people are happy to ‘tick off’ countries and cities after hardly seeing anything but the few main attractions.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Terrific points, Pete…you are right about the “bite size” trip for these cruise ships…they dump home for a few hours and then they re-board…just clogging the streets and not supporting the businesses….and you are right that without tourism is is no Venice
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Such a beautiful city. It’s a shame to see it sunk by tourism. I think they should ban the cruise ships for starters. Some of our national parks were being overrun here and they devised ways to help such as limiting cars during peak seasons.
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Yes, they unload thousands and thousands of people to clog the streets for a few hours then get back onboard, adding virtually nothing to the quality of life there…
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