Getting Around
Venice, compact and free of motor vehicle traffic, is an intimate city and a delight to explore on foot. Narrow lanes (calles) lead to hidden squares (campos) and across the arched footbridges that span the side canals (rios). It’s easy to become momentarily lost amid the maze of back streets and winding waterways that lead off the Grand Canal, but the bell tower of St. Mark’s Square is usually visible above the surrounding roofs. Most ships dock overnight in Venice, so passengers have the opportunity to explore the city at their leisure
Map of Venice and Area
Venice is also a base port, with the airport located across the water on the adjacent mainland. Road, rail and water bus transportation connect the airport to Venice. First-time visitors to Venice airport sometimes find the connections confusing and time consuming, so you might want to arrange transfers with your cruise line (through your travel agent).
Once you’re in Venice, by water is an ideal way to see the city’s sights, and there’s nothing more romantic than a gondola ride – especially at night when the city’s timeless magic is enhanced by the watery reflection of dancing lights and voices echoing down quiet side canals. Hiring a gondola is fairly expensive, with a 40-minute ride costing 80 euros during the day and 100 euros at night. Less expensive is a traghetto, a two-man gondola that ferries people across the Grand Canal at various, sign-posted places.
A vaporetto in Venice.
The most popular and reasonably priced mode of transport is to hop on and off the motorized river boats (called vaporetti) that are part of the city’s water bus service. They run the length of the Grand Canal, making frequent stops along the way. It’s a short walk from the cruise terminal to Piazzale Roma where a ticket can be purchased at the ACTV booth for a ride along the complete length of the Grand Canal to St. Mark’s Square. (A map and water bus schedule is available at the Tourist Information Office located just west of the St. Mark’s Piazzetta.)
The cruise lines usually provide their passengers with a reasonably priced boat shuttle that runs regularly between the ship and a drop-off point east of St. Mark’s Square. Private water taxis can also be hired.
The city’s water bus service also provides transport to other islands in the lagoon, such as San Michele (the city’s cemetery), Murano (famous for glass making since the 13th century) and Burano (a colourful fishing village and lace-making centre).
A water taxi heads towards the Rialto Bridge.
Venice’s main shopping area lies between the Rialto Bridge and Piazza San Marco, where shops and cafés border the square. Fine shops featuring handcrafted carnival masks can be found on Calle dei Fabbri. Other local crafts include glassware and lace.
St. Mark’s Square is lined with outdoor cafés, including the famous Caffe Florian, as is the waterfront area beside the Rialto Bridge. If you prefer to hang out with the locals, Campo Santa Margherita in the Dorsoduro district is a mix of private homes, restaurants, bars and off-beat shops.
Famous restaurants in Venice include Harry’s Bar (see map # 25), which was once patronized by Ernest Hemingway, Somerset Maugham and Orson Wells and the dining terrace of the Gritti Palace (map #26), where former guests have included Queen Elizabeth, Winston Churchill and Greta Garbo.
There is no shortage of luxury hotels in Venice, including the legendary Hotel Danieli and Gritti Palace. The cruise lines offer hotel packages featuring 4 – and 5-star hotels. If you’re looking for more modest accommodations, the small family-run hotels close to San Marco Square include Hotel Riva and Angeli d’Oro where rates start at about $200 per night. A brand name hotel also steps away from San Marco Square is the Westin Europa and Regina.
An intriguing aspect of Venice is found along the back streets and small canals of the city.
The fishing villages that were built on mud in the Lagoon of Venice eventually organized themselves under a doge (leader) in 697 and began to engage in seaborne trade. The port grew rapidly and by the 9th century Venice’s prosperity made it a target of Dalmatian pirates. This prompted the Venetians to build castellated houses for protection and guard the canal entrances with chains. As the pirate attacks increased in frequency, the Venetians responded by arming their ships. The newly born Venetian Navy defeated the Dalmatian pirates in the year 1000, and this important victory is still celebrated with great pomp on Ascension Day, with the doge’s gilded galley participating in the Wedding of the Sea ceremony, which symbolizes the marriage of the doges with the Adriatic.
Winding canals crisscross the enchanting city of Venice.
The Crusades brought great wealth to Venice, her fleet transporting Christian armies to the Holy Land. In 1204 the doge Dandolo led the Fourth Crusade’s storming of Constantinople, looting it of treasures. By 1216 the Venetian empire included strategic islands in the Ionian, Aegean and eastern Mediterranean, and the city’s native son and world traveller Marco Polo embodied the enterprising spirit of the Venetians. As wealth poured into Venice, its patrician merchants formed an oligarchy that maintained a tight hold on its political power through a secret police and Council of Ten, instituted to punish those who committed crimes against the state.
Venice became the envy of Genoa, a rival republic, and the two maritime powers battled for supremacy. Venice eventually emerged victorious but the city’s slow decline began in the mid 15th-century when its lucrative eastern trade was threatened by the fall of Constantinople to the Turks and by the discovery of an all-sea trade route to India and China around the Cape of Good Hope. Much of Venice’s seagoing trade fell into the hands of the Portuguese, Dutch and English, but the city remained a force to be reckoned with, achieving artistic glory during the Renaissance with large-scale construction of churches and palaces designed by renowned architects and embellished by artists such as Titian and Tintoretto.
Venice also shone musically. Monteverdi, the first great figure of opera, was appointed choirmaster of St. Mark’s in 1613 and Venice’s first public opera house opened in 1637. Antonio Vivaldi, whose father was a violinist at St. Mark’s, also lived in Venice in the early 1700s – teaching, playing the violin and writing music.
The 18th century was a period of economic and political decline for Venice, the city’s decadence personified in the Venetian adventurer Casanova who supported himself by writing, gambling and seducing women. Venice’s upper class indulged in a social life of nightly theatregoing and gambling, their sexual dalliances often taking place in private boxes at the opera or inside parked gondolas.
In 1797, Venice fell without a fight to Napoleon’s forces and was transferred by treaty to Austrian rule under which the city chafed for several decades. Meanwhile, opera continued to thrive, with Rossini premiering the first of a string of comic operas in Venice in 1810. Italy’s foremost composer of opera, Giuseppe Verdi, also premiered a number of his works in Venice amid an atmosphere of tolerance and freedom of expression, and the great German operatic composer Richard Wagner spent his final days in Venice, where he died in 1883. By then Venice had expelled the Austrians and was united with the new kingdom of Italy.
Some Venetians still long for a return to their city’s golden era of independence. Calling themselves Soldiers of the Most Serene Republic of Venice, this fringe political group staged an extraordinary, predawn separatist stunt in May 1997, when eight men stormed the bell tower in St. Mark’s Square. A few people were still sipping wine and chatting at one of the square’s cafés when a canal ferry docked at the piazzetta and disembarked a ramshackle truck carrying armed men wearing ski masks. They headed straight for the doors of the bell tower, reappearing minutes later on its balcony near the top, where they unfurled the golden pennant with the lion of Saint Mark. The incident ended without a shot being fired when police arrived to recapture the landmark tower.
Secessionist politics are likely the least of Venetians’ concerns. Venice, as everyone knows, is slowly sinking. The city is built on sand, silt and hard clay (which tend to compact over time) and some mainland industries have exacerbated the problem by lowering the area’s underground water table, as well as polluting the lagoon. As visiting cruise ships increase in size and numbers, there is talk of diverting ships so they not longer pass through the heart of Venice en route to the cruise terminal.
Map of Venice
Meanwhile, a shortage of affordable housing has prompted residents to move out of Venice. Thousands of workers commute each day to the city, which is connected to the mainland by a rail-and-road bridge. Many worry that Venice no longer belongs to Venetians, but to tourists and absentee owners who spend little time in their vacation palazzi.
Yet, despite the summer tourists and winter floods, this golden city of the seas will no doubt endure, as it has for more than a thousand years.
St. Mark’s Cathedral
1. St. Mark’s Square (Piazza of San Marco) – is the central meeting place of Venice and one of Italy’s most beautiful squares, dominated by the splendour of St. Mark’s Cathedral. Begun in 1063 and modeled after the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople, this ‘Golden Basilica’ is an outstanding example of Byzantine architecture. It follows the Greek cross plan, with each arm of the cross emphasized by a dome encased with gilt copper sheet and topped with an ornate lantern, making it visible from a distance and serving as a landmark for seafarers.
The church’s ornate facade consists of clusters of marble pillars and arches containing golden mosaics which glitter in the late afternoon sun. Gold is the dominant decorative element inside the cathedral, its walls completely covered with mosaics from the 12th to 18th centuries. Entrance to the church is free but there is a fee to enter the Sanctuary, containing the tomb of St. Mark, and the Museum, which houses four gilded bronze horses. These Greek sculptures from the 4th and 3rd centuries BC were brought to Venice from Constantinople in 1204 and were originally displayed on the church’s outside gallery, where replicas now stand.
Courtyard of the Doges Palace.
2. The Doges’ Palace (Palazzo Ducal) – begun in 814, was destroyed four times by fire and each time rebuilt on a grander scale to become a magnificent example of Italian Gothic architecture. The Palace, as residence of the doge and seat of justice, exudes wealth and power in its majestic halls, famous Golden Staircase and elegant rooms with their frescoed walls and ceilings.
Prisoners were led across the Bridge of Sighs to their cells.
3. The Bridge of Sighs (c. 1600) – leads from the Doges Palace to the former prisons, a hellish place where prisoners were held either in humid, above-ground cells that were subject to flooding, or in underground cells lined with strips of lead to render them unbearable in the summer heat. Casanova made his famous escape from the latter in 1756.
4. Clock Tower – Other buildings in St. Mark’s Square includes this famous tower built near the end of the 15th century.
5. Old Law Courts (Procuratie Vecchie) – which were begun in the 15th century,
6. Napoleonic Wing (or New Building) – built in 1807, which houses the Correr Museum, its collection of paintings, sculptures and precious objects tracing the history and art of Venice.
7. The New Law Courts (Procuratie Nuove) – were completed at the beginning of the 18th century. Beneath the portico is the famous Caffe Florian, which was frequented by Casanova, Wagner and Proust.
The Campanile soars above St. Mark’s Square.
8. The Campanile (Bell Tower) – was built in the 10th century and stands 325 feet (99 metres) high. The Loggetta, at its base, was designed by Jacopo Sansovino in the early 16th century and is decorated with bronze statues and marble ornaments. The tower collapsed in 1902 and was rebuilt a few years later as an exact replica of the original. Visitors can reach the balcony near the top by climbing the spiral staircase or by taking the lift.
9. The Old Library (Libreria Vecchia) – its construction started in 1537, was designed by Sansovino as a structural counterpoint to the Doges’ Palace – the former an educational institute, the latter the political centre of power. The Library became the prototype of Venetian classicism, with its double arcade and lavish use of decorative sculptures. The Libreria Vecchia faces the Piazzette.
10. The Piazzetta – which leads from the square to the busy waterfront of St. Mark’s Basin. The two columns standing here are from the 12th century – one holding a statue of the Lion of St. Mark, the other a statue of St. Theodore.
Church of San Giorgio Maggiore near the east entrance to Venice.
11. Church of San Giorgio Maggiore – When standing in the Piazzetta and looking across the water of St. Mark’s Basin, you can see an island containing where this beautiful church. Begun in 1566 and designed by Andrea Palladio, he introduced elements from ancient temples to Venetian church architecture.
12. Santa Maria Gloriosa del Frari – Venice contains many splendid churches, including this church which also displays paintings by Titian.
13. San Zaccaria – displays the Enthroned Madonna by Bellini.
A Celebrity ship departing Venice passes Santa Maria della Salute Church.
14. Church of Santa Maria della Salute – this often photographed 17th-century church stands on a point of land at the entrance to the Grand Canal.
The main thoroughfare of Venice, the Grand Canal is lined with residential palaces (called palazzi), their ornate and rippling patterns reflected on the water. The earliest palaces date to the 12th century and their basic features were carried through the centuries. A ground floor portico (for loading and unloading merchandise) led to a large hall where business was conducted; the family’s living quarters were upstairs where a large drawing room overlooked the canal.
Each palace was marked by a post, painted with the owner’s heraldic colours. Their styles range from early Veneto-Byzantine to Baroque, and Eastern influences are evident in such Oriental touches as delicate lattice work. Because there was little internal strife in Venice, the homes of wealthy Venetian families were built not like fortified castles but as lavish palazzi with fairy-tale facades designed for reflection in the waters of the Grand Canal.
Palazzo Loredan is now City Hall for Venice.
15. Palazzo Loredan – One of the earliest palaces this is now the seat of the City Council, dating from the 13th century and built in the Veneto-Byzantine style.
16. Gothic Ca’ d’Oro (House of Gold) – By the early 1500s the Grand Canal was astounding foreigners with its opulent palazzi such as this late Gothic example. Now housing the Galleria Franchetti, this splendid structure was built by a leading Venetian family in 1420, its lavish stone-carved ornamentation once coloured with red and blue pigments and glistening gilt.
17. Palazzo Vendramin-Calergi – The Renaissance introduced classical elements to the traditional Venetian facade, such as this palace completed in 1509. This famous palazzo, now a casino, is where the composer Richard Wagner died in 1883 and it became a motif in Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice.
18. Palazzo Grimani – Ever more and imposing palaces were built along the Grand Canal, including this 16th-century palace now home of Appeal Court.
19. Ca’Pesaro – Crossing the Rialto Bridge will take you to this impressive baroque palace built in 1710 and now housing an art gallery.
20. Ca’Rezzonico – The poet Robert Browning lived (and died here in 1889) and wrote several poems at this home owned by his son in the late 1880’s. Its beautifully decorated and furnished rooms are now open to visitors as the Museum of the Venetian 18th Century art. Cole Porter rented the palazzo for several months in the 1920’s.
21. Gallery of the Accademia – Art galleries of note along the Grand Canal include this gallery, its 24 rooms containing five centuries of Venetian paintings, with a large number of works by Giovanni Bellini.
22. The Peggy Guggenheim Art Collection – housed in the Palazzo Venier Dei Leoni, is one of most important collections of contemporary art in the world.
23. The Scuola di San Rocco (Great School of San Rocco) – on Campo San Rocco, houses a series of paintings by Tintoretto.
24. Rialto Bridge – The Grand Canal is crossed in the centre of the city by the Rialto Bridge (Ponte di Rialto), a single marble arch built between 1588 and 1591. The bridge’s arcades are lined with shops and nearby open-air cafes are a good place to watch the constant flow of activity in the Grand Canal.
South of Venice is the port of Ravenna, a centre of mosaic art in the 5th and 6th centuries. Shore excursions offered in Ravenna include tours to Florence and to San Marino.
Nestled in the Appenines near the Adriatic Sea, San Marino is the world’s smallest republic. A Christian stone-cutter from Dalmatia was said to have taken refuge on Mount Titano in the 4th century, and a community soon formed around the mountain’s three peaks. Only 24 square miles in size with a population of approximately 25,000 Italian-speaking inhabitants, San Marino’s treaty of friendship and economic cooperation was signed with Italy in 1862. The Italian patriot and soldier Garibaldi was granted refuge in San Marino in 1849, and in 1861 Abraham Lincoln accepted an honourary citizenship of the republic.
A land tour of Italy is an enticing proposition for passengers beginning or ending their cruise at an Italian port. In the country’s north are the majestic Italian Alps, beautiful lakes and Italy’s second-largest city, Milan. This prosperous city’s historic landmarks include the Church of Santa Maria dell Grazie (1465-90), which contains Leonardo da Vinci’s famous fresco, The Last Supper, and the famous opera house, Teatro alla Scala, which opened in 1778.
The city of Verona, a centre of trade since Roman times, reached its apex of power in the late 13th century when ruled by Ghibelline lords. A bloody rivalry between the Ghibellines and the Guelphs, portrayed in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, eventually weakened Verona. The 14th-century Casa di Giulietta (House of Juliet) is one of Verona’s top tourist spots.
Padua, connected by canal with the Po and other rivers, is home to Italy’s second-oldest university (after Bologna’s) which was founded in 1222. Galileo taught here, and Dante and Petrarch were students. Other famous landmarks in Padua include the six-domed basilica of St. Anthony, its high altar adorned with bronzes by Donatello.
Bologna has been a centre of learning ever since the founding in 425 AD of its Roman law school. Bologna’s famous university was established in about 1088 and the city’s Renaissance architecture includes palazzi, churches and an art gallery featuring works by Bolognese artists.
In Umbria, the town of Orvieto is famous for its beautiful cathedral, begun in 1290, its black-and-white marble facade decorated with colorful mosaics. Todi is another Umbrian town of note, containing Etruscan remains, Roman ruins and Gothic palaces.