威尼斯, 意大利Venice, Italy
别的我不管，但是威尼斯真的太浪漫了Whatever else you say about it, Venice really is that romantic.
从佛罗伦萨过来的火车，最后几分钟是在海上开的：长堤两边都是水，然后一头扎进圣露西亚车站。出了站，台阶底下就是大运河。威尼斯不给人缓冲的时间，一出门就是全部。我虽然做好了失望的准备，但是觉得 hmm 可能也许还是没白来啊。
在威尼斯，公交车是船。开船当然比开车麻烦，不过到了这里，也不过就是上班和回家。船靠站，人上人下，本地人和游客挤在同一条船上，各自做自己的事情。
上午坐船往南，去朱代卡岛。岛西头的老磨坊改成了酒店。一条漆得发亮的木船从水面突突地开过去。
在岛上我们错过了一班船。也没什么好懊恼的：顺势找了家小店坐下来，咖啡很好，面包更好。
拐进小巷，忽然一个人都没有了：橘红色的墙，树荫铺满石板路。在威尼斯，安静和热闹只隔一个转角。
中午走到学院桥。从桥中间望出去，大概是威尼斯被拍得最多的风景：安康圣母教堂的圆顶收住大运河的尽头。那天刚好有个活动，一队划艇从桥下经过。
在佛罗伦萨爬了四百级台阶，威尼斯客气得多：圣马可钟楼里有电梯。「叮」一声到顶，整座城在铁网外面铺开，广场缩成一个院子，红屋顶一直铺到潟湖边上。
总督宫的柱廊里凉快。从柱子中间望出去，圣乔治马焦雷岛像一条停在水上的船。旁边的小运河里，贡多拉排着队从叹息桥下钻过去。
傍晚的威尼斯是另一座城。游客像退潮一样散去，光变成金色，咖啡馆旁边的一面墙上，风车茉莉开得毫无节制。
日落之前，巷子先暗下来，尽头留一盏灯，灯后面是发亮的潟湖。难怪老故事总爱发生在威尼斯：男孩和女孩站在桥上，说好从此对方就是那个特别的人。站在这样的光里，谁都会把这种话当真。
沿着扎特雷长堤往回走。路灯一盏一盏亮起来，对岸救主堂的圆顶沉进暮色里，皮划艇从水道中间划过去。
后来我们找到一个没什么游客的角落，坐一会儿，站一会儿，看夕阳一寸寸点亮教堂的墙，把运河两岸烧成金色。
第二天上午坐贡多拉。船夫把我们摇进只容得下一条船的水道，桥洞一个接一个从头顶滑过去。快到终点的时候，墙壁忽然敞开，我们汇进大运河，像从后台走上舞台。
中午的水上巴士开向穆拉诺。到 Colonna 站时，隔着船窗和站台的玻璃，刚好和站台上的人对上了目光。
玻璃岛比名声安静。砖拱后面是空着的院子和一树绿，下午长得好像用不完。
布拉诺是颜色的岛。下午的船一靠岸就明白了：这座小岛用起颜料毫不手软，一栋房子一种颜色，连晾着的衣服都像配过色。黄墙上镶着一扇蓝窗，窗台下开着花。
傍晚回到本岛，又赶上一次日落。贡多拉船夫在暮光里摇桨，海鸥掠过大运河。走到最后一条小巷，尽头有一只蓝色的小船，安安静静地停在墙影里。
都说威尼斯在慢慢下沉，每年几毫米。出发前听到的也都对：人多，船挤，到处是游客。只是没人说过，错过一班船，就能换来半座空城；也没人说过，一座正在下沉的城，托东西托得这么稳：桥，船，还有两个走到脚酸还不想回去的人。
The train from Florence spends its last few minutes running on the sea: water on both sides of the causeway, and then straight into Santa Lucia station. Down the front steps, and there is the Grand Canal. Venice gives you no time to ease in; the moment you step out, you get all of it at once. I had come prepared to be disappointed, but hmm, maybe, just maybe, this wasn’t a wasted trip after all.
In Venice, the city bus is a boat. Running a boat is obviously more trouble than driving a bus, but here it is still just the way people get to work and back home. The boat docks, people file on and off, locals and tourists packed onto the same deck, each going about their own business.
In the morning we rode south to Giudecca. The old flour mill at the western end of the island is a hotel now. A varnished wooden boat puttered past.
On the island we missed our boat. No tragedy: we found a little shop and sat down, and the coffee was good and the bread was better.
One turn into a side lane and suddenly there was nobody at all: orange walls, tree shade covering the paving stones. In Venice, quiet and crowded are always one corner apart.
By noon we reached the Accademia Bridge. Looking out from the middle, this is probably the most photographed view in Venice: the dome of the Salute closing off the far end of the Grand Canal. There was an event that day, and a line of rowers passed underneath.
After four hundred steps in Florence, Venice was far more polite: the Campanile di San Marco has an elevator. One “ding” and the whole city spread out beyond the wire mesh: the piazza shrank to a courtyard, and red roofs ran all the way to the lagoon.
The colonnade of the Doge’s Palace was cool. Between the columns, San Giorgio Maggiore looked like a ship at anchor in the middle of the water. In the little canal around the corner, gondolas filed one by one under the Bridge of Sighs.
In the evening Venice becomes a different city. The tourists drain away like a tide, the light turns to gold, and on a wall beside a cafe the star jasmine blooms with no restraint whatsoever.
Before sunset, the alleys darken first, leaving one lamp at the far end and the lagoon glowing behind it. No wonder old stories always seem to happen in Venice: a boy and a girl stand on a bridge and agree that from then on, they will be each other’s special someone. In light like this, anyone would believe it.
We walked back along the Zattere. The lamps came on one by one, the dome of the Redentore sank into dusk across the water, and kayakers cut down the middle of the channel.
Later we found a corner with hardly any tourists, sat for a while, stood for a while, and watched the sunset light the church wall inch by inch and burn both sides of the canal gold.
The next morning we took a gondola. The gondolier rowed us into waterways with room for exactly one boat, bridge after bridge sliding past overhead. Near the end, the walls suddenly opened and we slipped out onto the Grand Canal, like stepping from backstage onto the stage.
The midday vaporetto ran out to Murano. At the Colonna stop, through the boat window and the glass wall of the stop, I happened to catch the eye of someone on the platform.
The island of glass was quieter than its reputation. Beyond the brick arches lay an empty courtyard and a whole tree’s worth of green. There seemed to be more afternoon than we could use.
Burano is the island of color. The moment the afternoon boat docked, it was obvious why: this little island does not hold back on paint. Every house gets a color of its own, and even the laundry on the lines looks coordinated. A blue window is set into a yellow wall, with flowers blooming beneath the sill.
By evening we were back on the main island, just in time for another sunset. A gondolier rowed through the dusk, and a seagull crossed the Grand Canal. At the end of the last alley, a small blue boat sat quietly in the shadow of the wall.
They say Venice is slowly sinking, a few millimeters every year. Everything else I had heard before the trip was true too: the crowds, the packed boats, the tourists everywhere. But nobody said that missing one boat could buy you half an empty city. Nobody said that a city could be sinking and still hold everything so steadily: bridges, boats, and two people with aching feet who still did not want to go back.
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