The elegance and beauty of the gondolas plying their way around the canals as pleasure boats or working craft is mesmerising. Their design reminded me of the Norse longboats and also Khufu’s solar boat; just two of the many symbolic and actual means of transport to the Otherworld for the dead. The mythologies present an enduring metaphor for the journey beyond, even as Frodo took the ship from the Grey Havens, the story continues into the twenty-first century. The necropolis (city of the dead) of Thebes in ancient Egypt was located on the west bank of the Nile, where the sun set, completing the cycle of (daily) life. The metaphor of the two sides of the city as inner and outer worlds, separated yet connected by the river, in both Egypt and Venice appeals deeply; as the hemispheres of the human brain are connected across the corpus callosum to provide fluid communication between inner (imagination/Otherworld) and outer (physical) worlds, providing robust bridges or reliable ferry connections (Channelling and Meditation) between the two sides fosters success.