and now we've got the half term and the sun's out again!

although you'd be forgiven for thinking that it has all been rain by the wonderful photo of a rather bedraggled John Hall Venice group here, as we headed for this year's Pizza Pub Quiz!

In fact the weather has been improving, but with occasional setback - see above!

It's also worth mentioning that, in the previous post, I'd put some photos of a wonderful opportunity that we'd had to visit the Palazzo Contarini Polignac for a memorable dance show by the Isadora Duncan Institute followed by a glamorous reception in the piano nobile, overlooking the Grand Canal, here's a few photos of that

Our second week was jam-packed with high-octane presentations, from Charles Hope's fantastic opinions on attribution, art histories and, in particular, Giorgione (or not!), Charlie Gere's dizzying journeys through culture, history and technology in the 20th and 21st centuries and Andrew Hopkins' architecture talks.

We introduced the Schiavi wine bar informal drinks, and those were great, and continued into Week C,

The week ended with our traditional Pizza Pub Quiz led by Susan and Louisa, and won (of course!) by the team that had called themselves Charlie's Angels! The valuable prize of solar-powered 'Golden' gondolas and a bottle of prosecco always highly appreciated!

We'd been to San Giovanni in Bragora to marvel at Cima's extraordinary altarpiece, and then on to the little Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni decorated by Carpaccio...and survived the rain!

and last, but certainly not least, we sadly said farewell to the wonderful Vicky, who had been with us for two and a half weeks in Venice, experiencing first-hand, everything about what she's been so brilliantly conveying to curious future students and parents for the past many years, and so she (and her gorgeous husband, Jim) got their Harry's Bar cocktail...here she is with our excellent Patrizia, who runs everything in Italy...