Burano and bees

Thursday 6 June 2013

My friend Plod and her husband Turtle came to Italy, Venice for a surprise birthday gift to Plod. I hauled Big Bear out of hibernation and took him on a train and a boat to visit them. They were not in Venice, they were on one of the islands staying at a hotel, or an agri-tourism.

We arrived at the train stationVenice, Santa Lucia, and neither Big Bear or myself (Thickness) had the address of the hotel, I suppose each had expected the other to bring the piece of paper I had written on in pastel-coloured pencil. Big Bear remembered I had sent the address to him, so we were able to find it searching his email stored on his cell phone.

Since the hotel was on an island, it meant walking a fair distance to the vaporetto, we did not mind. We had been stuck in the house waiting for the rain to stop, and on the Wednesday we visited Venice we had a resplendent glorious day. We stopped for coffee and I was surprised to find a regular coffee costs the same as it does at the bar around the corner.

We found the vaporetto and took a short ride out to Burano. Again we were lost and our friends found us in the huge vegetable garden behind the hotel. We had been gently advised by a local not to try to go in the front entrance, dressed as we were directly from the mountains and me wearing my hiking boots. 

We went for lunch at Al Gatto Nero, and were treated very well. It may have helped that Big Bear speaks Veneto and was able to order for us. It turned out as the lunch progressed that the owner could speak fluent English, heavily accented with an Edinburgh, Scottish accent. We ate mostly fish and then finally scampi, because this was Penny's favourite. It had just been delivered and was brought to our table so we could smell how fresh it was.

Plod and I have known each other since we were four years old, a long time. It is always as though we just saw each other yesterday and we pick up from there. "Do you remember?" She says, and I am reminded of how Plod has always been my memory. And then we say, "We must do this more often". Why don't we? We don't know. We talk of anything and nothing. Flit from one subject flower to another like butterflies sipping nectar. 

Which reminds me of the bees.

We went to visit them today. In one hive we found the queen bee with her tiny bright yellow dot, and the workers are all busy building up the cells in the honey store box to fill with honey. We didn't find the queen in the other hive, and the bees are busy dismantling the wax in the frames in the honey box. We find discarded wax on the metal floor of the drawer we pull out to clean.

We are beginners, and must now call the expert to find out what he thinks. We are only now able to easily identify the drones from the workers. We can identify the cells where more drones are waiting to hatch. We recognize the honey store, and where the pollen is kept. We find queen cells and leave them in the hope a new queen develops and that she and the drones remember to return to their hive after the wedding.

The only way to learn about bees is to experience, to pull out the frames one by one and look carefully, observe. 

I find that still I am learning this last ... to observe.