Why We Travel?

This past Sunday's New York Times (June 10, 2007) had a section entitled "Why We Travel" that included this beautiful picture of Venice. The above picture is of Mauro Trevenzoli, a Venetian Gondolier as he glides past the Piazza San Marco at nightfall on May 19, 2007.

Also included was an excerpt by Henry James' "Italian Hours" which was written in 1909. This is the excerpt:

“May in Venice is better than April, but June is best of all. Then the days are hot, but not too hot, and the nights are more beautiful than the days. Then Venice is rosier than ever in the morning and more golden than ever as the day descends. She seems to expand and evaporate, to multiply all her reflections and iridescences. Then the life of her people and the strangeness of her constitution become a perpetual comedy, or at least a perpetual drama. Then the gondola is your sole habitation, and you spend days between sea and sky.”

Henry James, “Italian Hours,” 1909