Venice day 4, to the islands.

On our fourth day in Venice we decided to visit some of the other island in the lagoon. Our very helpful and reasonable Alilaguna vaporetto pass covered all of the trips, so it was a 'free' day out. It was another very blue sky day but quite cold.
We had to get a vaporetto to the north side of the city to the Fond Nova stop and then another which went out to the more northerly islands.
Our first stop was Cimitero di San Michele, which is, as it says, Venice's cemetery. Here are the graves of Stravinsky and Diaghilev. In the early 1800's it was decided that it was too insanitary to bury the dead on the main island of Venice and so they were brought out here in special funeral gondolas for interment. The first picture is yet another view down a canal before we went to the islands.






Next it was Murano, the glass blowing centre of Venice. As it was January nothing was happening and the streets were wide, cold and empty, so we swiftly moved on.




Our furthest stop was Torcello, an island established in the 5th and 6th centuries with a population which once reached 20,000. With the rise of Venice Torcello's eminence wained and now only 60 people reside there. The ancient Basilica di Santa Maria dell' Assunta dates from 1008 and we went up the bell tower for a view of the lagoon and Torcello's canal. There were only a couple of other visitors on the island and it was eerily quiet and peaceful.












Our final stop was Burano, a bustling island of coloured houses, ringed by fishing boats. The church has a considerably wonky spire.














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