When Myra passed into the hands of the Saracens, some saw it as an opportunity to move the saint's relics to a more hospitable location. There was great competition for the relics between Venice and Bari. The Barese won the race and the relics were carried off under the noses of the Grecian custodians (Nicholas was Greek), the Saracens, and the Venetians. Legend has it that this race was pretty intense and resulted in the body of Nicholas losing an arm along the way. The Venetians could not go home empty handed however and managed to return to Venice with the relics of the Apostle Mark and the resulting edifice to house his remains is St Mark’s Cathedral in Venice. On May 9, 1087, the relics of Nicholas were safely landed at Bari. A new church was built to shelter Nicholas' remains and in the form of St Nicholas’ Basilica.
St Nicholas is popular and he's said to have been represented by medieval artists more frequently than any saint but Mary, and nearly 400 churches were dedicated in his honor in England alone during the late Middle Ages.
He is the patron saint of children and probably from this the custom arose of giving gifts to children in the name of Saint Nicholas on his feast day, December 6. The Dutch actually exchange gifts on the eve of this day, December 5. It was them that called him Sint Nicolaas, or more commonly Sinterklaas and it was this name and idea that has transferred into our modern day Santa Claus.
On Saint Nicholas Day it is traditional for the clergy of the basilica in Bari to lower a flask into the tomb of Saint Nicholas to extract some of the myrrh which is believed to exude from the relics. Containers of this myrrh are sent all over the world, and believers have reported numerous miracles as a result of being anointed with it. This is still collected each year and can be bought at the shop next to the shop for between 500 and 1000 euro a bottle!
From what I understand, St Nicholas is the only Saint shared by the Catholic and Orthodox Church. The Basilica in Bari is in fact a very unusual church in that it is shared by the Catholics and the Orthodox. Every week Orthodox services are conducted in the crypt and on Sundays Catholics have their services in the main area. The church and the city is a connecting point between the catholic and Orthodox churches with many pilgrims coming from the east and the west. In May a statue of St Nicholas is paraded around the city as a celebration of the arrival of the relics.
An interesting thing to note form all of the images of St Nicholas is that he is generally portrayed as having very dark skin. The central top image below shows a reconstruction by scientists of what Nicholas looked like.
This is a far cry of course from our images of Santa Claus today.
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