SEASON 5
- Richard Crooks
- Apr 1
- 4 min read
The Two Venices
Rather than jetting back to Missy Bear for her fifth season, I had the mad idea to drive there instead: a top-down, grand tour to Leros in the red S5.
She had just had her paintwork touched-up, finished with a ceramic coat and she was gleaming like new. It still surprises me how many complete strangers continue to take the trouble to hail me saying, “Beautiful car!”
But which route to take? There are innumerable permutations. There are some constraints to narrow it down a bit:
First, is that Leros is an island and our car doesn’t float. So that means the ferry terminal at Piraeus is one stopover;
Second, we had also decided to head via Italy, and not the northern Balkans (which we would cross on the return trip in July). We considered a ferry from Bari, but it’s a long old drive down the east coast to get there, and it’s a bit featureless, and I’ve heard that that road surfaces can be Gloucestershire-esque. So we opted for the Ancona to Igoumenitsa route. (Ancona is much further north on the earsten coast, so the ferry journey would be longer and overnight).
Third, those pointy, rocky things called the Alps are a serious consideration in early April. We could cross via the lowest pass – The Brenner Pass – through Austria. Or we could go via the Gotthard Tunnel in Switzerland. It sort of depends on the weather.
Alix pointed out the snow chains are a legal requirement in Austria, but that ‘snow socks’ are acceptable in Switzerland. (Given that we would be sticking to major routes that would be kept clear of snow at all times, I wasn’t keen on buying either. ) Also, you can buy a motorway vignette on-line for Switzerland, but have to buy one at the border in Austria, which sounded more of a headache. So, we ended up purchasing snow socks, and choosing Switzerland as our preferred crossing.
After that, I needed some more inspiration:
The first came from a fascinating book, ‘A Travel Guide to the Middle Ages’, by Anthony Bale. One theme was the trials and tribulations of pilgrims heading from northern Europe, including Britain, to the Holy Lands. One major stopping point was Aachen (Aken/Aix-La-Chapelle), which is a spa town and was the capital of Charlemagne, the first Holy Roman Emperor. That piqued my interest and so that waypoint was pencilled in too. I trusted that our pilgrimage would be swifter, less dangerous, and with better food and cleaner lodgings.
The second was from another present from Alix, the Lonely Planet book named ‘Epic Road Trips of Europe’. One such trip is the Romantic Road from Wurtzburg to Fussen in Germany. This is a winding trip ‘discovered’ and named by American soldiers after WWII. The route wends through undulating, vine covered hills, from medieval town to town, with the odd glimpse of a fairytale castle through the trees on a crag above.
Finally, having spent so much time reading about Venice and seeing Venetian influences around the eastern Med, I decided that it would be a sin to drive by without calling in.
So, there we had the bare bones of our route, and we would flesh out the details at our leisure.
With new tires fitted, we set off on March 29th, planning to arrive in Leros in the early morning of April 12th, ready for Missy Bear’s launch on April 14th. We spent a night at Folkstone and then caught a Chunnel train early the next morning. Going under the water rather than on it was novel for us! And, we were in our first of two Venices by late morning.
If you Google “Venice of the North” there are quite a few candidates, Leeds and Birmingham being two. However, Bruges certainly deserves the name. It is sometimes called Little Venice, with an emblem of a white swan. Apart from its magical canals, and the very proximal relationship of architecture to water, Bruges like Venice first flourished through medieval trade. It lay at the crossroads between the Hanseatic league and southern markets. One important commodity was wool which would arrive by sea in the sackful from Britain. Unlike today, the fleeces were highly valuable, and a lucrative source of taxable revenue for the English kings.
The wool often went directly to Italy. Genoese traders used the port at Bruges as early as 1277. The bourse, the first one in the world, was opened in 1309. And Venetian galleys arrived in 1314, to row and sail the wool back to the republic.
The canals are of brackish water from river and sea. The levels are controlled by three locks, with the level in the city is actually lower than the surrounding waters.
The medieval wharves are still there in the town centre, but Bruges was eventually cut off from the sea as the rivers downstream silted up. Its function and importance was taken by Antwerp, which still had a functioning sea access. Wool also declined in importance in the 16th century, as silk became popular, and England also developed its own textile industry.
It is extremely photogenic and famous painters such as van Eyck spent time here.
Few people actually live there as 65% of the buildings are hotels and ‘Airbnb’s. It is immaculately well kept, and we were blessed with sunny weather to explore it, first by boat and then by foot.
Today, Bruges feels to me like a living museum. Thankfully, when the Germans swept passed in 1939, they spared it. Our next stops on our pilgrimage, however, were to have fared less well!
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