I was a little apprehensive about visiting  Venice, because we’d heard from several people that Venice isn’t their favorite place in Italy. But once we arrived, the apprehension melted away in the bright sunshine. Venice was one of the most stunningly unique places I have ever seen.

I expected Venice to be a little like Amsterdam, where the canals are lined with streets for cars – not so. On the island of Venice, there are no cars. Zero. There are alleyways and sidewalks for walking, but there are no streets. Everything is done by boat – deliveries, ambulance, moving house. All done by boats, big and small.

Since we only had about 24 hours in Venice, we did a lot of walking and soaking in the sights, but we didn’t try to squash in museums or churches. Venice is also quite small, so our wandering took us around most of the island. And because we avoided tourist spots, we got to wander around places that weren’t packed with visitors. Thank goodness!

The best advice we got was to use the waterbus – their version of the metro! – and avoid the pricey gondolas. We got our gondola fix by taking the little shuttle gondola across the Grand Canal. You pay the gondola man 50 cents and pile in with all the locals, and the gondola takes you across the canal. Since there are only a few bridges where you can cross the canal, these gondola shuttles save you from having to walk to the nearest bridge. And in our case, they saved us from paying 90 euro to get on the gondola experience!

Venice, like most European cities, can be quite expensive. So we kept costs down by finding delicious take-away sandwiches and eating them at the edge of the canal.

My sister snapped my photo while we were waiting for the waterbus to arrive. Can you tell I was loving that sunshine?!

Logistics: 

We flew on Ryanair to Venice-Treviso airport and took the 45 minute shuttle bus (€7 each way) to the city. The shuttle drops you at the main train station in Venice. It’s beyond convenient. They even sell you the shuttle tickets on the plane!

Once there, we got a 24 hour waterbus pass, which was about 16 euro each. It allowed us to get to and from our B&B as well as take in all the sights. You can ride it all around the city, and the pass works for any waterbus route.

We stayed in a wonderful B&B in Venice called B&B Ai Bariteri. It was exceptionally clean and comfortable, the host and housekeeper were both incredibly friendly, and it was in a great location – right near Grand Canal and the Rialto Bridge. We found it at the very last minute, and it cost us a fraction of what we thought we were going to have to pay – only €100 for two for the night. Our room was on the top floor – 5 flights up! I think that would have been tougher in the heat of the summer, but since it was April, we just counted it as our exercise!

B&B Ai Bariteri
Calle di Mezzo 4966
30124 S. Marco
Venezia

Good morning! I’m back! Italy was amazing and I can’t wait to share lots of photos, info and tips with you. But while I settle back in and send my sister back to America today, I thought I’d leave you with Italy, according to my iPhone.

Venice:

We were so enthralled by Venice – which surprised us because a lot of people told us they weren’t so impressed. It probably helped that the weather was spectacular too!

Florence:

We found Florence a little overrun by tourists – much nicer in the early morning or evening so you could actually walk through the streets! But that Duomo. Man, he’s stunning.

Verona:

{This was our bill at dinner – calculated on a placemat and ripped out. It was a steal for the dinner we enjoyed!}

Lots more soon!