Getting around in Venice
We spent two weeks just walking around in Venice, Italy, in September-October ’07, not entering a single church or museum but going to a lot of dead ends and making sure we didn’t miss anything. It was rewarding and I would like to do it again.
Getting around Venice on foot is cheap and immediately available, but sometimes it’s a confusing time-waster because of the often missing and sometimes contradictory signage plus having to find a bridge to cross a canal.
To get where you are going may be a short distance as the crow flies but three times as far for you. To get to the other side of a canal, you may have to go back to a bridge, cross over and go forward again. Maps help, the bigger the better.
The bridges are a hazard for the disabled, and some are worse than others. At one point, we stayed on the wrong side of the Grand Canal from the rail station and vaporetto (water bus) stop and twice a day had to climb the Ponte degli Scalzi, which crosses the Grand Canal; it had about 38 steps. Most of the smaller bridges run 14 to 20 steps. Dragging a bag up those steps really is a “drag.”
On arrival, we avoided the P. degli Scalzi steps by using the service available at Piazzale Roma for delivering bags to your hotel. Situated at the head of the Grand Canal, P. Roma is where buses and cars crossing the causeway from the mainland to Venice drop off their passengers, who then take vaporetti to get to their hotels.
The baggage service is at the southeast corner of P. Roma. I recall no signs, just a few burly types in well-marked jackets; our cab driver knew where they were. The service had a conveyor belt for dealing with barges loaded with bags.
We had a package deal with the bag man and a water taxi: €20 for two people and four pieces, from P. Roma to our hotel across from S. Lucia, the rail station.
But there is good news in the bridge department: ramps. I saw two in Venice. One was near the S. Zaccaria vaporetto stop and the other near the Zattere stop. They looked as if they were made of metal scaffolding with plywood decks. The ramp at the Zattere was temporary, placed there because there was to be a marathon starting along the Brenta River and ending in Venice.
The city’s vaporetti have regular routes and schedules and are quite dependable. They have seats reserved for the disabled, and the operators are considerate of the disabled and helpful in boarding.
We used the 3-day pass for €10 (near $15) per day. A single-trip ticket cost €6, and passes were available for other short periods as well. The fare was not distance related but time related. Residents got a price break.
The tickets must be time-stamped (validated) before boarding. They don’t collect fares but check randomly for possession of a properly validated ticket. The lack of a properly validated ticket calls for a hefty fine.
We would use a vaporetto to go somewhere and either come back to the same stop or walk to the next one, stopping for a coffee whenever our legs demanded a rest. One time we saw many people with shopping bags, so we followed them “upstream” and found a market area which seemed to be the center of a small community. I visited an artisan’s shop and watched the application of gesso to models of books plus the burnishing of gilding.
A great deal of Venice is most unattractive, in my opinion — narrow streets (I think of them as alleys) with brick walls on both sides. Depressing, except that once in a while we find an oasis, such as a court that has been decorated with plants and flowers or a big open space with attractive buildings and signs of life. These discoveries are the rewards of the search.
For our first week visiting Venice we stayed in Mestre on the mainland and came in by rail.
The trains are cheap and, if you can manage the stairs, convenient. If you can’t manage the stairs, you take Track No. 1 and may have to wait half an hour before hopping on the next one for the 10-minute ride. The frequency of the trains is because Venice is a terminal for trains in all directions.
Our hotel, across the street from the rail station, was the Bologna, a Best Western — not bad. Three-star, I guess. (€300 [near $268] rack rate or €160 [$250] at www.hotelbologna.com.) It was nice to have a good, handy dining room. There were no handrails along the stairs.
The second week, we used Hotel Antiche Figure (e-mail info@ hotelantichefigure.it) in Venice and were well cared for. (€120-€340 [$187-$531].) It is located across the Grand Canal from the rail station where are located the nearest vaporetti stops. You have to cross on the Scalzi bridge, which is very awkward for people with bad legs, but we did it.
While its breakfasts were better than Continental, the hotel had no dining room and so no hot foods, and the coffee came from a multidrink machine and was not good. I wished I had taken my own powdered coffee and used their hot water.
In spite of the coffee, the Antiche Figure is a nice hotel, and were it not for my legs not liking the Ponte degli Scalzi I would stay there again.
As you leave the hotel, quite near to the left is Hotel Carlton and the Grand Canal. The Carlton’s restaurant’s food and decor were very good, but we found the service really bad and there were few other guests — not a good experience.
Keep on walking past the Carlton and you come to a small place with a somewhat limited menu but good cooking and pleasant service: Trattoria da Nino (Castello 4668; phone/fax +39 041 5235886, www.trattoriadanino.com). I would be glad to go there again. (3-course dinner, €17.50-€25 [$27-$39], or 4-course, €29.50.)
In the course of my wandering in Venice, I stopped to see some of the hotels near vaporetto stops. The ones on the canal were pricey (€400 and up) and should be reserved two months in advance, but go “inland” from the canal and the prices drop; one was as low as €100. Even so, reserve early.
I found our hotels by Googling “Venice Italy hotels.” Sites showed lots of hotels on a map, and I made up a list with distances to the vaporetto stops. I used a travel agency to do the booking. Travel agencies have a capability that the public lacks: they can “hold” reservations for the airline AND the hotel and only “book” when the arrangement is suitable.
I’ve found that travel agents are not very good at specialized location problems such as mine, but if you find the hotel yourself, they can do the booking for you for a service charge, and you have assurance that the room will be yours at the price you expect. Make sure that the hotel knows that they will not be charged a commission by the agency; you found the hotel, not the agency.
Anyone with questions may send me an e-mail c/o ITN.
G.F. MUEDEN
New York, NY