Day 7 - a painting day in Chioggia

"Chioggia is a place they call "little Venice". It has an amazing extremely large beach with endless cabanas and umbrellas.  I never dreamed there could be such a place!  It has another side where there are canals and all kinds of boats.  The canals and boats are separated by types and uses and they have a large fishing industry with a large amount of working boats.  This was supposed to be a painting day and I had by pack with me but never stopped to paint.  It was a wonderfully scenic place and I was content to take lots of photos.  First thing, I took a boat tour and saw many points of interest including a mussel farm and The Mose Project, the system intended to protect Venice with concealed gates at the lagoon inlets. After that I strolled around the working boat section, visited a very old church that has a painting by Tintorretto and ate at the fishermen's restaurant having spaghetti a la volgone (mussels) for a lot less than my friends spent for their lunch in another part of town.  I took a lot of pictures to use later for painting references.  By the time I finished roaming around this beautiful place with prettier colored buildings then Burano, I decided not to paint as I wouldn't have enough time so I went to the canals where the shops are to find people in my group and then we headed to the bus.  When we returned some of us went to the pool and it was very refreshing. Tomorrow is an early day, breakfast at 6:00.

Place where I ate lunch.

Lovely neighborhood section with people's personal boats.

The area where the shops are open daily, except mid-day.

Same section as above.  Even with the tourists, it feels like a normal town.

This is the area where some of our group painted.

The one-hour tour boat I took around the area for $10.

Canal on the right is where the tourist shops are.

The tour was in Italian, but I think this is the newer part of the city, not on the island section where the canals are.

Mussel farms

Grounded ship that has been there for decades.

I was looking at the facade of this man's house and he came out and wanted to make a phone call to America.  I told him I wasn't able to make any phone calls, which was true.  He gave me a DVD, and the hotel put it in their computer.  It was a movie, probably taken there, with American movie stars in it but in Italian.  I haven't seen that DVD since I unpacked.  Hmmmm.  Of course, he didn't speak English and I didn't speak Italian.

This is the beautiful church there with the Tintoretto painting.

They still sell cigarettes in machines.

Map of the town.  We parked at the upper right corner.

Our tour bus, heading home.

This is the area where the very very long beachfront is.  Notice that there are parks, entertainment facilities, rides, cabannas, all along, and then lounges/beach chairs.  This area seems like miles alongside the road, the water is beyond that.