LEARN HOW TO ROW VENETIAN STYLE
Nothing is more quintessentially Venetian than rowing down the quiet Lagoon and the city’s silent canals on one of its slender, elegant boats in the traditional style, standing up, facing forward.
It is called the voga alla veneta, and on this tour you will do it yourself. Because the iconic gondola is far too unstable for voga (Venetian rowing) lessons, you will learn to row in a hand crafted batella, or in a spacious and stable craft caorlina.
Thanks to the photographic eye of such painters as
Vittore Carpaccio, Giovanni and Gentile Bellini, Canaletto, and Francesco Guardi, we can still glimpse these boats, their oars, curious oarlocks, and standing boatmen performing the same expert, refined gestures in the Venice of centuries past.
For your lesson, you will first practice the basic stroke for rowing a prua (at the prow) as you navigate the Lagoon and along quiet canals. As tranquil waters surrounding you reflect ancient stones, bizarre architectures, noble dwellings, and endless bridges, your thoughts and emotions are suspended in a timeless atmosphere.
Every bend of the canals brings a new discovery. When into the open Lagoon you will be encouraged to try rowing “a poppa” — steering the boat yourself at the stern, just like a gondolier.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Navigation along beautiful and quiet Cannaregio canals
- Rowing in the Lagoon
- Learn about Venice environment
MORE ABOUT
THIS TOUR
ROW VENETIAN STYLE
Venice was born on mud flats, salt marshes and shallow waters of its expansive lagoon: with 210 square miles and an average depth of just about one meter, it forms the largest wetland in the Mediterranean.
The unique, stand-up voga alla veneta style of rowing was born in this environment, along with a variety of low, flat-bottomed, keel-less, easy to maneuver boats devised to transport people and goods through a meandering network of channels, canals, and tidal creeks.
A people of boatmen and merchants, the Venetians where masters of lagoon navigation and used it to make their city an invincible bastion. While over 50 different types of lagoon craft once existed for everything from fishing expeditions to transport of passengers and cargo of all sorts, speedy war galleys and fleets of round cargo ships were constructed in the Arsenale (a Venetian word meaning boatyard—not weapons
depot—created at the beginning of the 12th century) were employed to conquer Croatia, Greece, Constantinople, Crete, and Cyprus.
While the fall of the Venetian Republic in 1797 rapidly provoked the decline of ship construction, the making of lagoon boats has continued to the present day. For most tourists, any rowing boat in the canals of Venice is simply a gondola, but if you stop to observe the rowing traffic in any of Venice’s busy canals, you’ll discover quite of variety of boats that differ in shape, size, colors, and number of rowers skimming across the Lagoon surface, just as they have for centuries.
You will also notice that in all the Lagoon row boats (gondola, sandolo, s’ciopon, batella, caorlina…), the rower stands up facing forward so that he can see ahead in the intricate maze of the canals. following traditional traffic rules that came in use with the founding of the city itself:
Regulations stipulate that unlike roadway traffic, all boats must hold to the left, to allow enough water space for the stern oar, which propels as well as navigates, to work freely when two boats pass. Also, a boat going a contraria (against the current) must yield to boats going a seconda (with the tide current), lifting the oar out of the water if needed to make way.
Also, it is customary to shout out before making a turn: Oy! Ahoy! Each of these guttural cries (incomprehensible to the newcomer…) have a precise meaning, announcing presence and intended direction around blind corners, they help avoid accidents—but also create an aural ambience unique to this water city. O-oy!
DRESS CODE AND ADVICE
- Sunscreen, a hat, flexible shoes and a very casual wear will do!
COST
- 1-2 people 170 Euros – each additional person 60 Euros per person.
- A boat takes up to 4 people
- This tour lasts 1.5 hours.
CONTACT US
WALKS INSIDE ITALY
ART CITY WALKS aff. Network Giv
San Polo 1541 30125 VENICE, ITALY
C.F. e P. Iva 04331170276
Prot. 2016/16140 del 25-2-2016
Polizza Europ Assistance 8957877