Venice for Christmas

I first saw Venice in June 1984. It was a seer. I had arrived in Rome with an insane man (a misanthropic friend with all the composure of a bag of cats), his new wife, and an image of myself sitting in a white suit in the Piazza San Marco listening to violins while pigeons flew. Lord knows where this image came from. I had never read Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice nor seen Katharine Hepburn in Summertime. I picked up the suit in Rome, ditched my friends and drove to Florence and on to Venice. At a mediocre trattoria on my first evening, I met a photographer, a young woman from Mexico travelling through Italy. After snapping a picture of me in the suit, standing among the pigeons in the Piazza San Marco while violins whined the Beatles, she skipped town. Following a quick tour of the Doge’s Palace, I also fled the hordes for an Orient-Express train through the quiet Tyrol.

My dream has always been to spend Christmas in Venice, during the off-peak season. This was brought on by reading a travel article about a writer who did just that years ago – it sounded just magical. This year my dream came true. I have always had a real passion for Venice and with my love of photography, it’s a totally unique destination. My husband Brian and I spent 12 days in Venice for Christmas and New Year and we revelled in the absence of ostentatious decorations that are unfortunately so common, back home. We left home on the 21st of December arriving in glorious sunshine that lasted for the whole holiday. There is nothing more pleasurable than arriving by water taxi, especially with the light streaming onto the palazzi of the Grand Canal, turning them to burnished gold with the light once again reflected back into the canal streaked gold and blue; just divine, and the thing of Venice legends. Speeding along towards the Grand Canal it’s the light that seduces you every time and makes you feel so very alive.

Venice at Christmas time is truly magical. The misty grey weather makes Venice hauntingly beautiful and absolutely enchanting. Canals seem to belong, once again, to those long-lost centuries; past and ancient palaces seem to float upon white clouds. Ancient history and magical kingdoms meet in a delightful experience you’ll never forget. Venice at Christmas is surprisingly lacking the tourist crowds. Instead, you’ll find it full of locals and Christmas markets. Most of the main squares or campos have a market. Plenty of delightful Christmas concerts are held throughout Venice. They are easily discovered by reading the posters around the city or asking your hotel for advice. La Pieta church on the Riva degli Schiavoni, where Vivaldi was once choir master, hosts some of the best. If you would like to experience Venice in all its magnificence and you have a big budget for sumptuous luxury, then the following hotels are the ones I can recommend.

True to its authentic nature, Christmas is not a big commercial event in Venice. Typical Christmas decorations such as lights garlands and trees are confined to the busiest parts of the city: the Merceria, the Rialto and San Marco – mercifully not thronged with masses of tourists at this time of year. Occasionally, one can see a window or a balcony timidly decorated. Nativity scenes or presepi, on the other hand, are much dearer to the Italians. After all, the first Nativity scene is said to have been the creation of Saint Francis. It was a living one and took place in Greccio, a small town south of Assisi in 1223. Christmas trees, Germanic in origin, came to Italy and the rest of the world, via England and the United States and much later than the presepi. You can find Christmas trees in Venice even natural ones but only rarely in public areas.