Venice travel tips

Italy's romantic holiday city of Venice is exactly as it looks in all those postcards... a picture perfect amalgam of historic Romanesque buildings with seawaters lapping at the door, crowds milling in Piazza San Marco and gondolas weaving through a warren of tiny canals.

A rich history is evident throughout Venice, where you'll frequently spot the remnants of its medieval past beneath or within newer buildings that have been built over the past thousand years.

For many people, Venice can be the pinnacle of their travel in Italy.

Note Visitors to Italian cities such as Florence and Venice will be taxed up to five euros each a day from 2007, the levy probably being an accommodation tariff, to help the local municipalities maintain tourist structures and services.

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Venice is served by various airlines including Easyjet, Volare and Ryanair which offer discount flights from London.

There are numerous train connections to and from cities such as Rome, Geneva, Florence, Milan and Bologna.

At last count, Venice had a choice of more than 230 hotels, most a combination of luxury and more modest accommodation.

Venice was founded about 1,500 years ago on mudflats in the middle of a lagoon.

With the snow-capped Dolomites on its western horizon, the city prospered to become Europe's major east-west trading post, home to about 200,000 citizens.

The lagoon carrying the shallow wetlands and Venetian islands is about 48km long and 16km across at its widest point. Much of the city is built on ancient platforms of petrified timber pylons embedded in the lagoon floor. About 100,000 wooden poles dot the canals and lagoons of Venice to guides vessels through the sandbanks and shoals (although in 2009 the provincial government is considering replacing them with plastic).

Most of the 40 or so lagoon islands can be reached by water-bus (vaporetto) from Venice - #13 for Burano, Torcello and Sant'Erasmo; #41 or #42 for San Michele and Murano. To reach San Franesco del Deserto, take a taxi from Burano. Water taxis in Venice are comfortable and superbly maintained but have notoriously high fees. The vaporetto public water buses are much cheaper but can be uncomfortable and crowded.

The nearby island of Murano is best-known for its exquisite and popular glass creations, and the island of Burano to the north is famous for its pastel-coloured houses and fine lace work. Burano Island, occupied by about 7,000 residents, is a 40 minute boat trip across the lagoon from Venice and provides a quiet escape from the holiday crowds disgorged daily by visiting cruise ships.

Boats of all sorts navigate the canals of Venice. The hire of a striped shirt gondolier can be a romantic experience but they charge a small fortune for their services. It's worth noting that in early 2007 a thousand year tradition was broken when the Italian courts ordered that a woman and not just men be allowed to ferry a gondola.

Less than 100,000 people now live in Venice, which is almost exclusively dependent upon the tourist trade for its survival.

This is a tourist town so expect everything to be very expensive and aimed at your tourist dollars. It's worth noting that public toilets in Venice are scarce and usually require payment.

Travel to Venice and must-see monuments include the Basilica di San Marco and the Palazzo Ducale, along with dozens of historic churches, museums and galleries featuring superb examples of Italian Renaissance art. State museums are free for over-65s and under-18s, while there are reductions for the under 25s. Private museums usually offer discounts so it's worth carrying proof of identity and age.

Venice is a labyrinth of Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque architectural splendours. Tourists who travel to Venice should ensure they take a quality pair of walking shoes.

The history of Venice was spawned in the 5th Century AD when mainlanders fled barbarian invaders to settle the Venetian isles within the shallow lagoon waters which only they could navigate.

They had soon created one of Europe's most splendid trading cities and explorers such as Marco Polo had established a vast merchant empire with Venice the master of the Adriatic. For several centuries, Venice was the Mediterranean's greatest maritime power.

Venice is nowadays beset by problems such as flooding, subsidence and a dwindling population (about 60,000 in 2009) , but as many as 20 million tourists still travel to the city each year to create an economic spine. Most holiday tourists are daytrippers.

Venice can be muggy, particularly in the evenings, and mosquitoes often require netting to enjoy a comfortable night's sleep.

More than 400 bridges span about 160 canals criss-crossing Venice, which is made up of 117 small islands. The city covers just 7.6 square kilometres but has hundreds of churches, convents, palaces and mansions that would take months to fully explore.

It's true that the size of Venice makes it an ideal city to explore on foot but note that it's a maze of alleys and canals, and it's easy to get lost.

In Venice, the average January temperature is 3.8C and the average July temperature is 23.6C. If you travel to Italy in summer, be aware that Venice can be sweltering hot.

You can spend days walking and catching gondolas to admire the endless old palaces, courtyards and squares of Venice. Make sure you have a good map and understand where you are because it's easy to get lost in the maze of alleys that criss-cross Venice.

In its 17th Century heyday, more than 5000 gondolas glided through the waterways of Venice. About 400 remain and in 2007 the average price for a half hour ride is 73 Euro.

A holiday in Venice should include a trip on one of the city's famous gondolas, but they are overpriced and beyond the reach of budget backpackers. Walking is more intimate, a lot cheaper and better for you.

If you have the money, note that it remains legal for unlicensed tourists to hire a motor boat and cruise through the Venetian islands, although navigation can be a nightmare and the locals usually aren't impressed.

Many kilometres of pavements and alleys line the canals throughout Venice and it's worth getting a quality map that shows these walkways in detail. Many of these quaint narrow alleys are lined with small shops selling a fantastic array of Venetian lace, glass and masks, for which Venice is famous. Dotted among the shops are cafes, patisseries and grocers selling a smorgasbord of fine foods.

Travel tip ... if you're brave enough to hire a boat during your holiday in Venice so you can skipper yourself through the gondolas and barges, beware! Italian driving is as crazy on the waterways as on the motorways. Don't be hesitant and always remember that "right of way" is more a concept than a reality in Italy.

The speed limit on the canals is 5kmh to 7kmh, but the limit is rarely respected.

The annual Venice Carnival is held each January/February, usually attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors who share the canals and streets with musicians, acrobats, artists and people wearing ornate 18th Century masks. Much of the entertainment is focused on Piazza San Marco. Accommodation and food prices soar during the carnival, although prices are always higher in San Marco than elsewhere in Venice.

The tourist high season in Venice is from March to November and it's advisable to avoid the city in July and August because of the heat and number of holiday-makers.

Early spring is pleasantly warm, mid-summer is hot and crowded with tourists, and late autumn can be a bit too wet - athough sea fog can blanket the city and add to its romantic appeal. It often snows during winter, when tourist numbers are at their lowest.

Travel Tip: Travel in Venice during winter can be fantastic because there are few tourists, no queues, cheaper hotels and plenty of fine days. However, the evenings and nights can be cold.

A highlight of the tourist holiday season is the Festa del Redentore (Feast of the Redeemer), usually staged in the third weekend of July. Townspeople line the canals to enjoy a fantastic fireworks show and many then continue on to the Lido beaches where they party until dawn.

Another tourist drawcard is the annual Regata Storica, a colourful and flambouyant annual rowing regatta along the Grand Canal on the first Sunday of September.

The Grand Canal itself is about four kilometres long and has three classic bridges including the famous Rialto, with more than a hundred smaller canals that branch off. The modern Constitution Bridge across the Grand Canal also opened in late 2008 between Piazzale Roma to the Santa Lucia Railway Station precinct.

The Accademia is home to the city's greatest treasure of Venetian masterpiece paintings and the 17th Century baroque Ca'Pesaro houses Venice's modern art collection.

The historic centre of Venice is devided into six quarters - Cannaregio, Castello, Doroduro, San Marco, San Polo and Santa Croce.

St Mark's Basilica is open during summer from 9.45am to 5pm Monday to Saturday, from 2pm to 5pm on Sundays and holidays, and from 9.30am to 4pm daily between November and March.

The adjoining Palazzo Ducale is open from 9am to 7pm daily, although the closing time is 5pm during the winter months from November to March.

Perhaps the most stunning birds-eye view of Venice can be enjoyed if you take the elevator to the top of the Campanile bell tower of St Mark's Basilica.

If you want to briefly escape the tourist turmoil that is nowadays the life and soul of the city, it's worth heading to the far northern and southern islands where the traditional Venetian lifestyle can be more intimately experienced.

There are a few good restaurants in Venice but plenty of ordinary and poor ones that charge high prices, and many tourists who can find residential accommodation in the city choose to save money by cooking at home.

It's worth noting that the Venice municipality began a zero tolerance policy in 2005 to restore public decorum and is fining tourists 50 euros for removing their shirts and other supposedly "unseemly behaviour" including wearing tiny shorts or dangling feet in the canals. In other words, if you travel to Venice you should behave and dress well if you want to avoid a fine.

In July 2008, a law was passed making Venice the first Italian city where begging is illegal. Extra police have been assigned to crack down on beggars in tourist spots such as St Mark's Square, the Lido, the Rialto Bridge and Bridge of Sighs.

If you want to save a few holiday dollars, it's wise to avoid the at-times exorbitant accommodation prices in Venice by lodging on the mainland in one of various towns (such as Belluno, Castelfranco, Padua and Vicenza) within the Veneto hinterland region. A bus ride into the city only takes 10 to 15 minutes.

The most famous cafe in Venice, and possibly Italy, is the Caffe Florian, under the arcades of the Procratie Nuove in St Mark's Square. This cafe is a work of art in itself but it has about a thousand customers each day and a cup of coffee costs a small fortune.

If you want to see a bit of Venice but not lodge in the city itself, you can find some much cheaper and arguably more relaxing locations in the nearby countryside. For example, you can enjoy invigorating, therapeutic spas and mud baths in ancient towns such as Arqua Petrarca and Abano Terme within the Euganean Hills national park. There are often feasts and festivals within the 15 towns and villages inside the park.

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