Venice

Venice has its own personality when compared to Rome, Florence and Bologna. I can see how people have a love-affair with Venice. It is a romantic and family oriented city. Families run their businesses here. The restaurants we ate at were all run by family. The college age kids were the wait staff and the grandparents were cooking and the parents, aunts and uncles were collecting the food; mostly seafood as the city truly sits in the water. We left Bologna and took the train to Santa Lucia station. Make sure you don’t buy the Venice Mestre station fare as this is not on the island of Venice. There are plenty of hotels to choose from. Do your research because the rooms fill up quickly. It is also a bit more expensive here compared to the other cities we stayed at. The main form of transportation is water taxis called Vaporettos. They are numbered and include maps of the stops on the boat and at each station. Fares were 6.50 euros for a one way ride and you could also buy unlimited rides for a chosen period of time. There are different routes and many islands to explore and this is a great way to get oriented to the city and get dropped off in various locations to explore. Our first hotel was Rialto 1082. This was on the South side and walking distance to St. Mark’s Square. Remember to research how to get to your hotel because it is extremely difficult to find if you don’t have a variety of directions pre-planned to use. Luckily, I figured this out beforehand and had the exact details written down. Also, these buildings are old, tall and narrow and often do not have elevators so you will be dragging your luggage up many flights of stairs. Our hotel was located in a very narrow alley (road in Italy but NO car would have fit) and it was run by a family. The hotel is run by Damiano but his father was there for the weekend and he spoke NO English at all. We played charades and my dad speaks a little Italian so we got it all figured out. Luckily, the hotel had Wi-Fi and I could use my iTranslate app that I loaded on my phone and we could communicate that way too. The rooms were spacious and each had a large bathroom. There is a rooftop area to enjoy and a breakfast room with a specialty coffee machine. It was clean and cool and in a great location!

We explored the area and went to Doges Palace in St. Mark’s Square. If you are into visiting old palaces then you will enjoy this museum. Also, there are rooms of medieval weaponry that were intriguing to look at. The views from the top floors were breathtaking. Afterward, we sat by the water and had drinks and Italian pizza and seafood. We payed for the location as my iced coffee drink was 13 euros! Cruise ships were sailing out and it is unbelievable to see them wiggle their way through this snake-like narrow canal.

That evening we explored the city and went shopping. The next day after breakfast we explored some more and then took the vaporetto to the stop near the people mover to embark on our cruise. The best information to handle these details was found on the Imboden’s veniceforvisitors.com website. The people mover is a tram that relieves you from the long walk to the port and it costs 1 euro per person. When you get off, you must walk a bit to your ship or your ship’s shuttle area found by the name printed on a tent. I will soon write a review/blog of the cruise for more information. After our wonderful cruise, we walked from the ship back to the people mover and it was SO crowded. It seemed like four cruise ships disembarked at the same time and the line for the people mover was long and people from all over the world speaking many languages were trying to understand what was going on. I ended up helping many people as they were confused again. The language barrier was intense but I must have had that “I can help you face”! I didn’t mind at all. Once we were near the hotels again, we had to find our hotel. I did not research the exact location and only had the address. NO ONE knew how to find this! We stayed in one spot with our luggage and sent my husband on a wild goose chase. The island of Venice is divided into neighborhoods. We knew the neighborhood so that narrowed down the area but there are still hundreds of “streets” here. If you have been to a cornfield maze, then you can imagine the unique maze of Venice (water is the corn in this scenario). About 30 minutes later, he came back with a smile and I knew he found it. Two bridges later and we were at the hotel which looked like a regular building out front with no signs that it was a hotel. It was a big beautiful door on an old building. That’s all folks! I can’t believe he found it! The hotel is called Ca’ Dei Polo and it was one of my favorites. The décor was traditional Venetian style and this palace was large, extremely clean and had a sitting room, Wi-Fi, a breakfast room, a courtyard and fronted a canal. The staff was very nice. Both hotels we stayed at in Venice had 5-10 rooms and provided quality service. We enjoyed this location as it was on the north side of the island allowing us to explore different areas for the rest of the weekend. We had wonderful meals by the water run by families. We shopped for real Murano glass jewelry (make sure it is stamped so you know it isn’t a fake) and we bought masquerade masks, and wine stoppers. We went for long walks away from the tourist areas learning how the locals live. I love being near the water and felt safe wondering around this city.

Have a detailed map handy because it is easy to get lost. The hotels have maps. On our final day we walked to the Piazzale Roma, the bus station, which was near the people mover. We bought bus tickets at the small kiosk but you could also get them from the driver. We used ATVO because they have an express bus to the airport that is reliable and is 5 euro per person one way. There are maps with the times and it is also printed at the kiosk. It took about 30 minutes to get to the airport. I also downloaded “Italian To Go” which is a tiny booklet (that you put together) and it helped me out a little bit each day. It’s found on under free downloads and called Travelers Pocket Phrase Guides. www.livinglanguage.com/content/downloads/Italian_ToGo.pdf I (we) loved Venice and will go back. We could spend a week here, just like we could at the other cities we were able to visit.