St. Somewhere and Venice

I am somewhat reluctant to reveal where we went next. It is a relatively unspoiled and quite beautiful village south of Florence. I'd like to keep it that way. Nothing personal. Really. It is also a - all together- medieval walled city. It is called San Gimignano. I am telling because the only way to get there is by car or bus,and I know that many of you would ever be caught dead in a bus.
Now that I think of it, there is nothing special about the place. There are fewer tourists than other places we have visited. Ironically, we travel overseas as tourists to go to places and judge the experience expecting to see no other people like us. Are we ruining the places we most love by going there in such numbers?
The village sits as a citadel on top of a hill with spectacular views of the Tuscan countryside all around it. There is a Michelin cited restaurant in the village, and on the day we visited there was a village market in the town square with every manner of produce and regional product.
P.S. Don't go.
From San Gimignano we took the bus to Poggibonsi to catch the train to Venice. It is a shame that the US never developed an effective passenger rail network. Punctual, clean and ubiquitous train lines make travel In Europe a  pleasure.
Leslie had been to Venice before, she knew about the vaparettos or water busses and she knew the area where our hotel was. Please indulge me while I declare that our hotel, the Ca Zose, was run by a coven of the most brusque and inconsiderate people we have experienced on the trip. Again, don't go. This time I mean it.
None of my imaginings about Venice prepared me for the majesty and beauty of the place. It is also the only truly ancient city that I have ever visited, where I can visualize life hundreds of years ago. Other than the invention of motorized boats, I don't think things are done a great deal differently - at least not in the areas around the Grand Canal and tributaries. While there we visited the Peggy Guggenheim Museum of Modern Art. Her personal residence right on the Grand Canal during her years in Venice, was turned into a museum displaying her collection upon her death. I loved this place. The art and the size were perfect. In the evening, we attended a Vivaldi and Hayden concert for strings in a small church. At intermission, i began talking to a Russian man who turned out to be an Orthodox priest. The subject of Syria came up. He questioned whether the US had a right to get involved which i thought was a strange  position for a priest. I told him that I thought that the issue in Syria was more humanitarian than political, and offered that the world would be better off without Putin. I am not sure anything was settled that night, but we did shake hands upon parting.
The next day we raced to St. Mark's Square just ahead of the cruise ship visitors and ducked into the cathedral. Afterward, we took photos of the square, church and Doge's palace. Then we bought 12 hour vaparetto tickets and took off for Murano Island, home of the famous Murano glass forges and Burano Island, the main endeavor of which is looking picturesque. As we were running out of time and had to get to the ferry port by 5PM, we decided to splurge and hire a water taxi to take us on a tour of the Grand Canal before dropping us off at the ferry.
We were on our way to Croatia!