This first section is a brief explanation of my Italy blog posts, which were inspired by my 2-week trip to Italy in May, 2025. Feel free to skip this section if you’ve read it before.
Dear Reader, If you read my Italy posts in the order in which they’ve come out, it may seem as though we hopped back and forth all over the country, but I have decided not to write these posts sequentially. I want to write about the things that interest me most, as the spirit moves me. For some topics, I may even combine cities. I hope that by doing so, you’ll find it a lot more interesting than if I just give you a tedious day by day description of our itinerary, as if I were your Aunt Mabel forcing you to sit down and watch all her Super 8 films of the family road trip to Niagara Falls from 1966.
If you have any questions, comments or suggestions about how I’m approaching this travelogue-within-a-blog, please let me know in the comments below!
Dear Husband and I had spent the morning wandering through Venice, doing things that tourists rarely do, and it was a pure delight. But those events were the appetizers of the day. Today I feel like writing about the main course. We had set aside the rest of the day to visit two other places outside of the city yet still in the Venetian Lagoon—Murano and the San Michele Cemetery.
There are 118 islands in the Venetian Lagoon, the bulk of which are uninhabited. Visiting two of them hardly makes one an expert. But when you consider that many tourists don’t even take the time to explore outside of Venice proper unless they’re on organized tours, I was feeling rather proud.
It’s really silly that people feel the need for a tour guide for these little islands, because they’re so easy to get to and are even more walkable than Venice itself. Simply make your way to the Fondamenta Nove vaporetto (Water Bus) stop, and if you got a 3-day pass when you arrived at the train station like we did, you simply validate your pass and hop on the vaporetto (Either line 4.1 or 4.2 will get you there) that departs every 10 minutes. It’s impossible to miss the San Michele Cemetery. It’s the first stop. You have been looking at it across the water the entire time you’ve been waiting for the vaporetto. (I wish I could take credit for this night image. A friend found it somewhere in cyberspace, origins unknown. If need be, I’ll take it down. But I’m not profiting from it, so I hope the fact that I think it’s amazing will be payment enough. The second photo is a side view of the island that I took.)
(And by the way, your vaporetto’s motor is going to sound like gravel being put through an industrial-sized blender, especially when docking. They all sound that way. I have no idea why. It was startling at first, but you get used to it. And even if your vaporetto were to sink, in most places in the lagoon, you’d simply stand up and be in chest high water, so it’s not like you’d drown. You’d just have to contend with some really worrisome contaminants.)
Anyway, you hop off the vaporetto at the first stop to visit the cemetery, and there you are, basically. The entire island is the cemetery {with the exception of Roman Catholic church called San Michele all’Isola with its blown glass Madonna (entirely appropriate, given the island we’d visit next), the remains of a monastery, the crematorium, and the public bathroom (which you’d be well-advised to take advantage of before exploring)}. It’s only 0.068 square miles in size and it has been Venice’s main cemetery since 1807.
The cemetery is divided into several sections. The main area is a consecrated Catholic burial ground, but there are separate Protestant and Eastern Orthodox sections. Jews are buried on another island entirely, which is sad. Theres a section for priests and a section for nuns, as well as a section for gondoliers. The section for bambini is large enough to leave a lump in your throat.
This cemetery is one of the few things that Napoleon seems to have actually done for the Venetian’s best interests. Before he came along, residents were burying their dead under churches or simply under paving stones in the city. Since Venice is known for its regular floods, this was unsanitary, so Napoleon outlawed it.
As you can see from this image, this island is unnaturally square, because it’s been built up over time. Even so, since it’s been used continually since 1807, space here is at a premium, so unless you are a VIP, you can only lease grave space for 12 years. After that, your bones are placed in an ossuary.
There are several notable people’s graves at the San Michele Cemetery. We found Igor Stravinsky’s easily, as people had covered it in rocks, coins, shells and flowers. We looked for the poet Ezra Pound’s humble little headstone, but we had no luck finding it. (And from the talk online, we weren’t alone in this exercise in futility.) Another celebrity burial is that of Christian Doppler, of Doppler Effect fame. You can find several foreign royals scattered about, as well as various diplomats. The Scottish historian Horatio Brown is also somewhere in there.
I was surprised at how many headstones were in English. And as the highest point on this island is a mere three feet above sea level, we saw a lot of graves that were sunk into the ground or sharply tilted or cracked. Some were so old and faded that they were impossible to read.
But it was a peaceful place, despite being surrounded by the loudest seagulls I’ve ever heard in my life. I mean, those gulls were screaming loud enough to make me jump. (I almost said “to wake the dead” but thought better of it.)
There were also lizards and butterflies and other birds, and the sculptures and fountains lent a wonderful ambiance to the place. Even though the landscaping wasn’t kept up very well, it was beautifully designed, and it made you feel like you were taking a walk in the country. It would be a great place for a picnic, if it weren’t against the rules, and the mosquitoes, which only seemed to bother you when you stood still, could be persuaded to leave you alone. If it really is possible to rest in peace, I think this would be an excellent place in which to do it.
After wandering in the San Michele Cemetery for about an hour and a half, it was time to head to our next destination: Murano Island. I was going there on a mission. I had been wanting some Murano glass of my very own for much of my adult life. Murano glassmakers, for centuries, have been known as some of the finest glass artisans in the world. So off we went to the vaporetto stop once again.
On the short ride over, let me hit you with a little history. The island of Murano was first settled by the ancient Romans. It was a fishing village and was also known for its salt production. Around the 11th century, people started moving to the mainland and the island declined.
In 1291, the glassmakers of Venice were forced to move to Murano, as the municipality feared that they would cause fires in the city. They also wanted to closely guard their glassmaking secrets. Once you moved to Murano, you were not allowed to leave, for fear of revealing those secrets to the wider world. But there was incentive to stay, because the Doge allowed the daughters of glassblowers to marry into the most noble Venetian families.
For a time, Murano was the main producer of glass, especially mirrors, in all of Europe. The oldest glass factory still active today was founded in 1866. But these glass factories are now under threat. Producers around the world are making cheap knock-offs of their artisanal wares, and once Italy became part of the European Union, gas became more expensive, so the cost of obtaining all the ingredients needed to make glass, such as sand, soda, and wood, none of which are native to the island, has greatly increased. Those costs have increased 5 times more since the Ukrainian War, making it all but impossible for the glass factories to keep the fires in their furnaces burning. So I may have gotten my glass in the nick of time.
Vaporetto lines 4.1 or 4.2 will both get you to the stop that most tourists hop off at: Murano Colonna stop. That’s the perfect thing to do if your top priority is shopping. It’s the first, most convenient stop. But we had to make sure we took the 4.1, because it also stops at Murano Museo after that. The museum was where we wanted to go first for reasons I’ll describe below.
Two pieces of advice if you want to get authentic Murano Glass: 1) Avoid the shops right there at the Colonna stop. They’re selling cheap Chinese knock offs. And sadly, such shops are scattered throughout the area, mixed in amongst the authentic shops. So, 2) if you want to be absolutely certain that you’re looking at authentic Murano glass, look for the Vetro Artistico Murano label inside or underneath each piece. This label has been produced by a consortium of authentic Murano glass factories since 1985. You can also find a nifty guide to the codes on those labels here.
When you buy Murano glass, you’re not only obtaining a thing of pure history, artistry, and elegance, in all its imperfect glory, but you’re also making an investment, because if you take good care of your glass, it will hold its value for years to come.
But Dear Husband and I did not want to dive headfirst into the shopping. We wanted to do a little sightseeing, and we didn’t want to lug our fragile purchases with us for the rest of the day. So we got off at the Murano Museo stop. We planned a walking loop that would save the main shopping street, Fondamenta dei Vetrai, for last, so we could make our purchases and then hop on the vaporetto and head back to Venice.
As our vaporetto stop’s name probably suggested, our first stop was the Murano Glass Museum. That was an excellent choice because we got to see how innovative Murano glassmakers are, and how trends and techniques have changed over time. We also saw videos of the various methods they use to achieve their results. I think this gave us a greater appreciation of the items we saw in the shops. I was particularly impressed by how rods of different colors of glass were made, and then combined together to make the iconic millefiori glass that Murano is so well known for. We also saw some glass artistry meant for display on walls that was so intricate in design that it took my breath away, along with beads and even a glass trumpet (I have no idea if it actually functions. Probably not.)
From there, we stopped for some refreshments because it was a particularly hot day, and there’s very little shade in Murano. (Beware in Italy: restaurants will be happy to sell you a drink, or an ice cream, but if you choose to sit down at one of their tables rather than take it to go, they’ll charge extra for that. Usually they’ll tell you that up front, but not always. It’s up to you to decide if it’s worth it.)
Next we attempted to go to the 12th century basilica next to the museum, but the windows of opportunity for tourists to enter are extremely narrow, and we missed ours. That’s a pity, because they say that the mosaics on the floor are amazing, and behind the altar are 4 huge bones that are said to belong to a dragon (but of course are actually of some large extinct mammal). Ah well. No dragon sightings for us. But the freestanding bell tower was kind of cool.
So we wandered down a few quiet, peaceful back streets and over a bridge or two. There are no cars on this little island, and it gives you such a feeling of peace. We discovered that an art installation I had read about (a giant blue glass comet) was no longer there, but that was fine, because we came out right where we wanted to be: at the North end of the Fondamenta dei Vetrai. (Incidentally, you can also visit some glass factories and see the glass blowers in action, but it was getting late, and we wanted to make sure we had enough time to shop.) Here are a few images from around town.
We didn’t shop at first. Real Murano glass isn’t cheap, and I was determined to avoid all regrets, so I wanted to see every single option before I made my choices. So we walked the entire street, and I made mental notes.
While going into all the legit shops, we also stopped at the most high-end shop on the street, Venini at #47. I spent the entire time terrified that I was going to break something, because these things were wayyyyy beyond my price range. I was afraid to breathe. They were beautiful, but oddly enough, not really to my taste.
We also went into the Simone Cenedese Shop at #68. That place, without a doubt in my mind, had the most gorgeous glass on the entire street, as you can see. Absolutely, positively, totally my style. But again, not within my budget. At this late stage in my life, I’m thinking it won’t ever be. Oh well.
In truth though, the minute I saw the shop I was going to buy my glass from, I knew it. I could have saved us a lot of walking. But no. I had to go all the way down the street, looking… looking… and only then go back. The shop was at #82. Domus Vetri d’Arte not only had items that I absolutely loved, but they were reasonably priced (for Murano glass, anyway), and the shop had a welcoming atmosphere. (Some of the places we went in felt intimidating, as if we were intruders, and that turned me off. This shop, on the other hand, felt cozy, and the proprietor made us feel comfortable.)
This particular shop sells work from a variety of glass factories, as opposed to some of the other shops that were created just for one. So you still must look for the authentication sticker on every single piece, because it is always possible that there could be some authentic work mixed in with some less so. The pieces I got come from a very small but legitimate place called La Fernasotta. You can tell by the codes on the sticker.
In fact, while we made our purchases (and I say “our” because DH couldn’t resist getting some himself), the proprietor chatted with us. The first ever American pope, Pope Leo, had only just been chosen, and he asked us what we thought of that. And having recently seen the documentary Chihuly: River of Glass, a documentary (which I think you can see on Prime) which talks about, among other things, Chihuly’s art installation in Venice, I asked him what he thought of Chihuly. He had never heard of him.
On hearing that, I was howling with laughter inside. Dale Chihuly is from my neck of the woods, and I do love his work (I’ve even blogged about it here), but he has the reputation of having a bit of an ego. So, to hear that someone who is deeply embedded in the glass business, in the most famous glassmaking place on the planet, had never heard of him, would probably not go over well with the man. For some reason that makes me smile.
After leaving the shop, we walked down the street, and the weight of our purchases in the bag felt really satisfying to me. Like a dream fulfilled. Something that the 10-year-old me, so poor that she lived in a tent, could never have imagined would actually come to pass. It was a really gratifying.
The south end of the street is right by the Murano Colonna vaporetto stop. There are so many options for returning to Venice that your best bet is to look at the vaporetto map once you know where in Venice you want to go. Venice is actually a group of Islands that is shaped like a fish, and we chose to take a vaporetto that would take us around the “tail” and drop us off at Piazza San Marco. Even though we only viewed the “tail” from the water, it was still kind of fun. Most tourists don’t go to that end, because there are very few touristy things there.
When we got back to our room, Dear Husband ran out and got us some pizza, and I stared longingly at the bag. Our glass had to remain sealed up until we got home for customs purposes. That nearly killed me. (Little did we know, customs wouldn’t even bother looking.) But getting back home and opening those boxes felt like Christmas in May. They were every bit as beautiful as I remembered.
And now, without further ado, here is the Murano Glass that I’ve been waiting for my entire life. The three on the left are mine. The two on the right are DH’s, although technically they’re all ours, of course. I can’t tell you how happy it makes me, every time I look at these pieces. Having them, and having gone to get them in Murano itself, feels like an achievement. I’m not really into stuff, but these are now some of my most prized possessions, especially because they come with so many happy memories of that day in May when we got to wander the streets of Murano together.
Anything is possible, Dear Reader. Dreams really can come true. You just have to prioritize them.
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