Venice Day 3 - Murano - the island and the famous glass

If you ever are in Venice and you wonder if a trip to Murano is worth it, YES IT IS.  Not only is it a wonderful boat ride, the island itself is a beautiful little town and the bonus is you get to watch some master glass blowers and actually see some of their amazing works of art. 

Jim and I were lucky in that the hotel we were staying in gives you a free water taxi ride over to Murano, it picked us up at the hotel, and in record speed (these guys are not slow and are maniacs on the water) drop you off at the pier for the glass company you are stopping at.  We were met at the dock by a lovely young lady who spoke wonderful English and explained everything that was happening to us and gave us a history of the Murano glass making artists. 

Sitting on benches with the canal lapping up at the walls and being only 15 feet max away, you were able to see all the little intricate things he did to make this amazing pitcher.

 We were so mesmerized we don't really know how long it took, but I don't think it could have been more than 20 to 30 minutes. 

The lovely young lady now took us on a tour of the showroom, no pictures allowed, these were all one of a kind works of art.  All of a sudden it started to feel like I was at a timeshare meeting.  Everytime I saw something I liked, it was picked up, put on a beautiful table to show it off to it's best, the calculator was out and the price for those beautiful 6 glasses and pitcher normally would be4000 euros but today only 1200 euros, what is your address we can have them waiting at home for your return.  Fully guaranteed, if they break in your lifetime we will make you a new one.  OUCH, 1200 euros for 6 glasses, the pitcher was 1000 euros itself.  Okay maybe we will keep looking, there were plates, there were violins, there were beautiful chandeliers.  There was one chandelier that was very familiar when I asked her about it she said the very large (very very large) version is at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. 

After dutifully walking through all the beautiful works of art, we said we would think about it :).  We now thought we would be escorted back to the water taxi pier.  NOPE, very politely she showed us to the back door and told us to take the bus.  :)

Thankfully we did go out the back door, because what a lovely little island Murano is, with lots of little shops (where I did buy a Murano glass ball made probably by one of their lowly apprentices) and we did stop for a lovely lunch (pizza - I do love my pizza). 

We finally find the water bus and off we go back to St. Mark's square for our mid afternoon wine break while we watch the gondolas and all the action.