Overall

My wife and I have been visiting Venice pretty much every year for the past 10 years. Having read the reviews on this website, I can say that there is a grain of truth in them all, positive and negative. Yes, Venice is very busy, but it you stay on the island, you can avoid the worst of the crowds by staying away from St Marco and the Rialto during the day (when the day-trippers throng this particular area) and go there in the evening when it is much, much quieter. There is so much to see that this is no problem and is something we very quickly learned to do. The outlying islands need a couple of days to see them properly, and the back streets of Venice are pure eye-candy. Athough there is some graffiti and untidiness in places, you show me a major city where there isn't evidence of this. Prices can be high for food, but there are a few supermarkets where you can buy bread, cheese, salami etc and a packed lunch therefore costs next to nothing. Hotel breakfasts are expensive for what you get and if you can find a hotel where this is optional, you can get a much better deal at the various local bars (stand, don't sit!). In the evening you can get excellent takeaway pizza (proper pizza, not the mass-produced stuff) and a glass of wine (bought from the supermarket) rounds this off nicely! Hotels can be horrendously costly, but we stay in small back street hotels which are clean and comfortable with en suite facilities for less that £60 a night (for the room, not per person) - a fraction of what I have to pay for a hotel when staying on business in any UK city. Flights cost next to nothing. Stansted to Treviso (get the bus from outside the airport to Venice for about £6 return) cost me £60 (including taxes etc) for two returns for September 2007 (less that one single flight from my local airport to Manchester!). The vaporetti in Venice are not as cheap as they used to be, but last time we were there we used them for six days and it cost about £35 all in. Essentially, you can see Venice at its best and for a very reasonable cost but you do need to do your research and prepare just a bit. Us, we love it and can't wait to get back in September as we couldn't go last year.

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Great for: History/Culture, Theatre/Music

Last Visit: September 2005

1 July 2007 | A Yahoo! User

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