Day 7 - Monday 18th September - Venice

Today for lunch we were going to head back to our favorite restaurant in Venice, Villa '600, which is on the island of Torcello, the first island to be inhabited in the Venetian  Lagoon. We went there a few years ago and fell in love with the place and the food. Knowing we would catch the vaporetto at Fondamente Nova we headed towards Zanipolo again, where we stopped for a coffee then made our way to the best bookshop in the world, Acqua Alta. We haven't been able to resist buying something here every visit. This time I came out with a book of Venetian landmarks and scenes drawn in biro and watercoloured and with lovely descriptions. John bought yet another Veneto/Italian dictionary. Oh and I bought each of the girls a lovely pencil with a swarovski crystal and venetian mask on it. We took more photos on the stairs made out of piles of books that have been ruined during the acqua alta (when the canals overflow and flood the streets and stores and residents have to wade in gum boots to get around their beautiful city). We also stopped to buy a new umbrella for John because it was supposed to rain later. When we left Acqua Alta we started walking towards Fondamente Nova, or so we thought. Instead we had easily made a wrong turn and ended up at Rialto so we headed up the bridge to my favorite jewellery store, Gioielleria Eredi Jovon. Last time we were in Venice John bought me a beautiful blue cameo of Le Tre Grazie del Canova and we chatted to the lovely young man for ages, he put me on his email list and I've been receiving updates from the store.  His dad made all the jewellery and carved the delicate cameos as taught by his father and he passed his skill on to his sons who now have taken over since he died and their mum runs the store with them. I knew about a special filligree wedding ring with a 500 yr old tradition that they make which is the symbol of eternal love and eternal luck and wanted to check them out. The mum, Gabriella, was in the store with Marco, one of the sons and she showed us the rings. We both feel in love with them so we decided to get one each in silver and Gabriella reels the story of the ring as I'd read on their website. As she said, 'it may not be true, but we Venetians say it costs nothing to believe it'. Sounds good to me. We chatted about Australia because she'd been on a holiday and loved it, then we made or way to the vaporetto stop for Torcello. John bought another pair of his Venetion burgundy slippers at the same shop where we bought his first pair (well you never know when you'll have another chance to get replacements!). We were at the island of Torcello before we knew it and sitting on the terrace looking onto the beautiful garden full of trees, benches and gazebos.  Our waiter bought us lovely basket of mixed breads and we shared a mixed Venetian seafood antipasto which was as delicious as we remembered and then John had tagliatelle with gamberi (prawns) and zucchini and I had gnocchi with crab and cherry tomatoes.All washed down with a half carafe of prosecco. Deeeelicious. We finished with Tiramisu for me, of course, and Bavarese (a bit like pannacotta) for John. Ask we can say is that we'll definitely be back next trip. After a very relaxed lunch we sauntered to the remnants of what would have been the old town, had another look around,  took some photos, which we've probably already taken in the past, then sauntered back to catch the ferry back. We did stop at Ponte del Diavolo, The Devil's Bridge, which has no sides or handrails,  to take some photos and then were on or way back when the clouds started coming over. Perfect timing after lunch but we hoped it would wait til we got home to rain.  It didn't. We did have our umbrellas but by the time we got close to home my shoes and feet were wet. We stopped for a spritz out of the rain and then head home to dry off. Another wonderful day in our beautiful Venice.