When you arrive at Piazzale Roma follow the signs for Rialto or take the Vaporetto line 2 and get off at the Rialto stop. Here you can admire the oldest bridge that crosses the grand Canal.
Rialto Bridge: Before it has the look you can see today, it was bridge of boats, then wooden bridge and then drawbridge to facilitate the passage of the boats. It remained the only bridge that crossed the grand Canal until the 1854, when it was built the Accademia bridge. The Rialto Bridge was built for the necessity to deal and to trade.
The Rialto market is still very popular with all the Venetians, especially on Saturday mornings, a day dedicated to shopping and is full of stalls of fresh fish and vegetables and fruit from the gardens of the lagoon Island of S. Erasmo.
After visiting the market and the bridge, cross it and take the busiest street in Venice:
The Mercerie, the long artery that leads from Rialto to San Marco. Along this road you can find many shops, including the historic Pasticceria Rosa Salva where we recommend you to taste the little pizzas and the pastry. Continue until the end of the road and you will find yourself in San Marco, the most elegant square in Europe, surrounded by old and new Procuratie with its most famous cafés: the historic caffè Florian and the Caffè Quadri. Don’t be surprised at the high prices if you sit in the stallage of these two bars: you are looking at one of the most beautiful and especially unique places in the world, you are seated on a piece of history and culture. If you don’t want to pay much then don’t sit outside and take coffee at the bar:-)
At the end of the square stands the Basilica of St. Mark with its 8000 square meters of mosaics covering the walls, vaults and domes, mosaics that tell 8 centuries of history. In front of the Basilica rises El Paron de Casa, the bell tower of San Marco that with its 100 meters of height was also lighthouse for ships that entered from the sea in the basin. The square opens towards the lagoon with the Doge’s Palace on one side, and the Marciana library on the other.
The Ducal palace was the seat of the doge and of the most Council, its beauty is based on a cunning aesthetic and physical paradox, connected to the fact that the heavy bulk of the main body is supported by those that seem slender inlaid colonnades, inside works of masters such as: Tintoretto, Titian, Veronese, Jacopo Palma the younger etc. Our advice is to follow the guided tours.
The Marciana Library is one of the largest Italian libraries and contains one of the most valuable collections of Greek, Latin and oriental manuscripts of the world.
In 1603 came into force a law that imposed on each printer Veneto to deposit a copy of each book printed at the Marciana, which thus became the institutional Library of the Serenissima Republic. After the fall of Venice, the collections of religious bodies suppressed by Napoleon went partly in the Marciana library.
In 1811 the library was transferred to the Ducal palace. Only in 1924 he returned to his historical headquarters. Today it occupies, in addition to the Palace of the bookshop, also the factory of the mint of Jacopo Sansovino.
The columns of San Marco and Todaro are the two columns that stand in front of the pier of the square and of which we have already spoken here
The clock of the Moors (the Clock tower) is the door that leads from the Mercerie to Piazza San Marco. The Watch’s dial is in gold and blue enamel; Mark Now, day, moon phases and Zodiac. It is also equipped with a carillon mechanism, traditionally activated only on the days of Epiphany and Ascension. At every hour, the side panel of the hours opens to let pass a carousel of wooden statues representing the characters of the Nativity and the Magi.
Famous are the so-called Mori of Venice, nicknamed for their brown color by the Venetians. Placed at the top of the tower on a terrace, are two bronze statues depicting two shepherds who beat with a sledgehammer the hours on a large bell. They are very similar but not equal, and the visible difference consists in the particular of the beard, of which one is lacking. The bearded moor is called the “old One”, the other the “young”. This attribution of roles contributes a specific detail. The Moors mark the hours by beating the bell with their hammers (many chimes how many hours), but with a precise mode. The old moor beats the hours two minutes before the exact hour, representing the time that has passed, while the young Moro plays the hour two minutes later to represent the time it will come.