We were sailing last night and woke up in Chioggia (pronounced like ‘key-O-Ja’). We thought it was a small fishing village place but it looks big, with large ships and trucks (haven’t seen those it quite sometime). We looked at a map of the Venezia Lagoon and see that Chioggia is at the south end. We heard that the lagoon is 56 km long and 11 km wide, and throughout the lagoon there are 180 separate islands, many connected together by the over 400 bridges within the lagoon.
We headed off to visit the weekly fish market in town, that’s what Chioggia is famous for – fresh fish. The fishermen go out everyday and catch fish then come to the open air market and sell to people of the town. Everyone must like fish because it was super busy there. We saw all sorts of big and small fish, even octopus
We learned that Chioggia was first settled by the Romans about 2,000 yrs ago. It was a perfect location for establishing defensive positions against possible enemies and they found the area perfect for salt production that was in high demand.
In the afternoon we ventured out to the countryside to the Ca’ Zen Estate to hear about the agriculture of the area and try some local favourites, like prosciutto, percorino cheese and focaccia bread. We heard how the people of the area worked over the past few decades to reclaim the marsh land along the river and develop high quality farm land producing fresh produce for the region. While we were there we got to visit their horses, too.
In the evening it was 70s dance party night in the lounge on the ship. Everyone was dressed in retro costumes, with peace signs and such. It was fun to listen to the old time music and dance to some favourites.
Well Behaved Kids Travel 