The kids were the first up; they got dressed while I splashed some water on my face, and bounced down the stairs to the panificio to get breakfast. Then I went all the way back down again to drop off the garbage, which got picked up every morning (except Sunday) by people wheeling huge metal carts through the narrow calles.
After breakfast, we set out to the west. It was clear and bright, but the temperature was reasonable. Our first stop was the Ca d'Oro, to see its small museum. The highlight for the children was probably peering between the Gothic arches on the canal facade to see the tourists on the vaporetti staring back at them; that, and Mantegna's Saint Sebastian, the patron saint of body-piercing.
We took a traghetto after that over to the edge of the Rialto market; it was crowded with shoppers, and the kids had to stand up in the gondola, but did quite well. We continued walking to the west, unfortunately on the main route between the Rialto market and Piazzale Roma, with a consequent increase in tourists.
We made it to the still shaded Campo San Giacomo dell'Orio, rested on a bench for a few minutes while the kids consumed some excess energy running about, and then went in to see the church. It was the building itself rather than the art that was interesting; the kids speculated extensively on alternative uses for the ship's-keel roof and N and I examined the two columns looted from Byzantium during the Crusades.
A short distance back was the Palazzo Mocenigo, with its period furnishings and costumes. The kids and I had enjoyed this on a rainy morning in 96 while N was in Padova at the conference. They enjoyed it this time again, though it was getting hot. A complained when we ran out of rooms to see. N and I concluded that Murano glass chandeliers were ugly even in their natural setting (I am pleased to see that JG Links agrees with me).
We trudged back along the main tourist route to the Rialto, which was getting quite crowded, with Z in the lead. Just the other side of the bridge, we turned north and abruptly lost most people, who were from that point heading to or from San Marco.
Lunch, in the apartment, was leftover tortellini in pesto, with the remains of the salame, the breadsticks from Giudecca, and sparkling Prosecco. Z, N, and I napped for a couple of hours while A read through all of James and the Giant Peach and still had time to make some greeting cards for her soon-to-arrive grandfather.
It was fortunate we had chosen this day to rest, because it was still quite hot when we went out again in the late afternoon, after a snack of melon and peach. We strolled through Campo S. Maria Formosa, keeping to the shade, and appreciating the unusual sight of men with gas-powered weed whackers out "mowing the campo".
We were heading for the Fondazione Querini-Stampalia, which in addition to another small grab-bag museum, offered a chamber music concert at five. We had time to see the collection before sitting in a frescoed and gilded room and listening to two musicians from the Venetian Centre for Ancient Music playing three concerti for viola da braccio with continuo (clavichord) by obscure Baroque composers. Z was a bit wiggly and A took her onto her lap, but A was entranced, reading every movement description in the programme and smiling at those (such as "allegro") which she recognized from her violin study. The half-hour went by quickly.
After the concert we briefly viewed the rotating exhibit, which was about Tibet, and then went shopping at the Su.Ve and picked up more vini sfusi (Prosecco and Pinot Nero this time).
Dinner was the rest of the butterflied sardines (fried in a nonstick pan in considerably less oil than the day before), the caparozzoli bought the day before (not improved by the day in the fridge, but still quite edible, though the kids had more trouble detaching them from the shell), ciabatta from the nearby panificio, cannellini beans, cherry tomatoes, rucola and radicchietto salad, and the rest of the Prosecco frizzante.
After supper we had planned to take the kids out for gelato, but A lost hers by attempting to kick her sister down the stairs while I was lecturing her on said behaviour. I took Z down to the Campo San Zanipolo and bought her raspberry and coconut ice-cream (from the bit I licked off the sides, as mediocre as the coffee I'd had there earlier) which she ate on a bench on the edge of the square. Then it was home to bed.