Reviews of Italy

If you're familiar with reading my opinions on the places I have visited, you will know that I rarely use more emotional adjectives. It's unusual for me to use the words "magical" or "enchanting", and even more so, the word "ethereal". However, all of these adjectives could be appropriately applied to the astonishingly beautiful city of Venice.

I visited Venice between Christmas and New Year at the end of 1998, and some of the city's sights have stayed with me very vividly - and not just because I've still got photographs to look at! On our first night in Venice, having checked in to a hotel, we went for a random wander around the area, without guidebooks, to try to get a feel for the city. As an aside, I strongly recommend doing this whenever you arrive in a new place - take the card of the place you're staying so that if you do get lost, you can ask people for directions - as you soon get used to the local geography of the city. Anyway, as we wandered through the narrow alleyways of the San Marco region of the city after dark, the alleys lit by understated white twinkling Christmas lights, we stared down the city's canals, which had been lightly touched with a covering of mist.

Nothing, however, prepared us for the sight of the Piazza San Marco. We vaguely knew we were near it, but a lack of guidebook meant we didn't realise how near. The view across the square was truly magical. The buildings around the square were decorated with lines of white Christmas lights, and the Basilica San Marco, at the far end of the square, was shrouded in fog, giving it an ethereal, otherworldly quality, as though it were some vision of another world that could evaporate at any moment.

This was my introduction to the beauty of Venice, is it any wonder that I fell in love with the place, as so many others have before me?

GETTING THERE

Getting to Venice is surprisingly easy, given that it's on an island several kilometres out from the mainland. There are two airports that serve the Venice area, both on the mainland - Venice Marco Polo and Treviso, and there is a large train terminus on the island itself.

When I visited in 1998, I flew directly from London to Venice Marco Polo. Most major operators fly to Marco Polo, and cheap flights are available from London Stanstead on Go. Marco Polo airport is located on the coast of mainland Italy, just to the north of the umbilical Ponte della Liberta bridge that connects the city of Venice to the mainland.

Getting from Marco Polo airport to the city of Venice itself can be achieved in a number of ways, depending on how much money you want to spend, and how much of your holiday you'd planned in advance.

Most guidebooks recommend taking the regularly scheduled launches from the airport to the San Marco landing stage. Tickets can, in theory, be bought from the office at one end of the arrivals hall. However, tickets for the launches have often been bought up by package tours, necessitating a wait in the airport for tickets to be available. If you're determined to arrive in the city of Venice in water-borne style, you can pay to travel by water taxi, which will cost you about six times more, but take less than half the time the launch does.

If you're cheap, like me, you'll probably be more interested in the road-based means of getting to the city. The ATVO bus service runs between the airport and the Piazzale Roma on the west side of the city, to meet each flight. This service is considerably cheaper than the water-borne methods. If you dither around in the airport too long, and miss the ATVO bus, there are regular local bus services, which are even cheaper but take longer, as they stop to pick up passengers en route. Tickets for the buses can be bought from a booth in the arrivals hall, or (if you have coins) from ticket machines just outside the airport.

If you don't want to demean yourself with a bus journey, there is a taxi rank outside the airport, but bear in mind that the taxis won't be able to take you any further into the city of Venice than the buses do!

GETTING AROUND

There are two particularly noteworthy things about the organisation of the city of Venice - its canals, and its narrow alleys. The canals run throughout the city, and vaporetto (water bus) services run along the wider canals and around the island, as well as to other islands around the Lido. For tourists, these are therefore both useful for getting around the city swiftly, and for giving good views of the tourist attractions from the water. Tickets can be bought from most launches, or from shops showing an ACTV sign. There's no financial benefit to buying several tickets at one time, but there is a time benefit - you won't have to queue so often!

Route 1, confusingly named Accelerato, runs along the Grand Canal through the city stops at every launch along its length. It's a nice route for seeing the length of the canal from the water, but it's not as fast its name suggests. Route 82 also runs along the Grand Canal, stopping at fewer launches, before heading around the west and south of the city. Route 82 gives more of an impression of the lives of the city's inhabitants, visiting the Tronchetto island to the west of the city - the car park where the city's workers park each day after driving over from the mainland - as well as letting you see the south side of the city from the water.

The other public service on the Grand Canal is the traghetti - large gondola ferries that cross the canal at several points. Since there are only three bridges that cross the Grand Canal, these ferries offer a swift and cheap alternative to getting across the water.

Also, the canals are home to the city's gondolas, essentially only used by tourists - though Venetians do use gondolas on their wedding day. I didn't actually go on a gondola trip around the city, mainly because of the monumental cost of doing so, but for many it's an essential part of their visit. Agree a price with the gondolier before leaving - overcharging is rife! Oh, and don't expect your gondolier to sing...

Finally, the last water-based mode of transport in Venice is the water taxi - wooden motorboats which buzz around the city. If you want to take a water taxi, you'll probably have to book it in advance, or you'll have to wait at one of the city's ranks. You'll need an over-stuffed wallet too.

Because the city's streets are so narrow, the only really practical ground-based means of getting about is by foot, once you've left the Piazzale Roma.

ORIENTATION

So before I go on, I ought to mention the organisation of the city. The city itself is built on a roughly ovate island. The Grand Canal runs through the city, in a backwards "S" shape from northwest to southeast, dividing it into two halves. The Piazzale Roma, where the bridge connecting the island to the mainland begins, is located to the west of the southern half of the island.

Most of the city's tourist attractions are located at the eastern end of the southern half of the island (the Dorsoduro and San Polo regions), and on the southern side of the northern half (the San Marco region). The north and east of the city (the Cannaregio and Castello regions respectively) are more residential, but are no less charming than the rest of the city - in fact, the relatively low number of tourists make them more relaxing and pleasant to wander through.

There are several major islands around the Lido, served by vaporetti from Venice itself. For example, the island of Murano, well known worldwide for the quality of its glassware, is located to the north of the city. Giudecca is a long thin, primarily residential, island located to the south of Venice, separated from it by the wide Canale della Giudecca.

ACCOMMODATION

Venice attracts around twelve million tourists every year, and most of these stay in the city for a few days. Inevitably, this means that the city is absolutely filled with hotels and guesthouses. Even outside of the main tourist season, you'd be well advised to book long before leaving for the city.

When I visited in 1998, the only place I phoned about accommodation in Venice was the Ostello Venezia youth hostel located near the Zitelle launch stop on Giudecca island, to the south of Venice. They told me that at the time that I would be visiting the city (between Christmas and New Year) there would be no need to book in advance, and that there would definitely be rooms available. In the Summer, tourists wishing to stay in the youth hostel would be well advised to book in advance [Telephone: (041) 523 82 11]. The youth hostel is one of the most beautifully located in the world, offering excellent views across to the Doge's palace and the Dogana di Mare.

My basic plan upon arriving in Venice was to walk through the city toward the youth hostel (or rather, a vaporetto stop that would take us to the hostel), stopping at several hotels en route, and asking if they had any rooms available. Most of the hotels I visited were completely booked up, but we did eventually find a room in the three-star Hotel Centauro [www.hotelcentauro.com, Telephone: (041) 523 91 51] just off the Campo Manin in the San Marco area of the city - less than five minutes walk from the Piazza San Marco.

For the money, it wasn't the best hotel I've stayed in - but the service was extremely polite and friendly, and the rooms were very clean and pleasant. Because of earlier bookings the hotel had made, we had to move rooms during our stay, but the hotel's staff moved our baggage between rooms for us during the day.

Venice offers hotels to suit all budgets, though there are far more high budget rooms in the city, than low budget - if you plan on staying in Venice cheaply, book early. In fact, if you plan on staying in Venice at all, book early!

EATING OUT

Much like the city's options for accommodation, eating out in Venice can be a very costly experience. However, having said that, if you wander into the less touristy areas of the city, you can find some real bargains. The best bet, if you're on a budget, is to go for restaurants' set menus, rather than select specific dishes. A number of restaurants around the Pescheria (fish market) in the San Polo area of the city seem to offer cheap menus, for example, and this area appears to be relatively free from tourists after dark.

There are some truly excellent pizzerias in Venice. We visited the Da Silvio restaurant on Calle San Pantalon, in the Dorsoduro region for some excellent calzones, and the La Porchetta restaurant on Calle della Cortesia in the San Marco region for pizzas topped with porchetta (roast suckling pig).

Wine is, of course, essential with your meal. Most menus include carafes of house wine, though if your palate is more refined, you might want to pay that little bit extra for better wine. You'll also want to try prosecco, a light, sparkling wine produced in the Veneto region of Italy.

The most expensive restaurants (and hotels, for that matter) are to be found on the Riva degli Schiavoni - the pavement leading east from the Doge's Palace, next to the opening of the Grand Canal. Don't even think about popping in one of them for a quick coffee - your wallet won't thank you!

At lunchtimes, we tended to pop into bars in the city centre, most of which offered squares of pizza that they would heat in a microwave for you. Certainly this worked out cheaper than going into restaurants at lunchtime too.

CLIMATE

When I visited Venice, it was the middle of Winter, so the place was very cold (only a few degrees C), with only a few hours of sun each day. In the Summer, temperatures get up to 20-25 degrees C, and you can expect to get eight or more hours of sun per day. Venice has higher rainfall than most other areas of Italy, due to the nearby mountains and the surrounding sea - chance of rain is about the same throughout the year.

Those who've visited the city in the Summer months have frequently complained of the smell of the city's canals. In the Winter, however, there was no such problem - none of the canals smelt at all.

ART AND ENTERTAINMENT

Venice is, and always has been a major world centre for art. The Biennale, an international exhibition of contemporary art, takes place in the city from June to September every odd-numbered year. Artists are selected in around forty to fifty countries around the world, to provide work for the international pavilions, which are erected in the Giardini Pubblici to the east of the city.

There are several superb art galleries throughout the city - from the Accademia gallery in the Dorsoduro region, with its Renaissance Venetian art, through to the Peggy Guggenheim gallery with its outstanding collection of modern art, collected by Peggy herself. The life of Tintoretto, one of Venice's best-known artists, is celebrated by the works he painted on the walls of the church he attended as a parishioner, the Gothic Madonna dell'Orto in the Cannaregio region of the city.

Virtually all of the main tourist attractions in the city - the Doge's Palace, the Basilica San Marco, the Palazzo Ca'Rezzonico, and the Santa Maria della Salute, for example - are filled with beautiful, priceless artwork.

In terms of entertainment in the evenings, the city of Venice itself has relatively little to offer. The majority of those who work in the city actually live on the mainland - either parking in the huge Tronchetto car park during the day, or commuting by train. This goes some way to explaining why the shops in the city close so early, and hence, why there's so little do in the city after dark.

Nonetheless, many of the city's churches are often used as concert halls, and it's likely that some classical concerts will be on during a visit to the city. It's worth picking up a copy of "Un ospite di Venezia", a free bilingual booklet telling you what's on in the city, which is available from tourist information centres or most hotels.

The opera house in Venice, La Fenice, which was the opening venue for many well-known Italian operas, including Verdi's 'Rigoletto', has been closed since 1996, when the house was completely destroyed by fire. There are plans to rebuild and reopen it, one day...

The main entertainment event of the calendar in Venice, is the Carnevale - literally "farewell to meat" - which has been celebrated in the ten days before Lent in the Veneto region since the 11th century. Essentially, it's an excuse for wearing masks and costumes, and parading about. Numerous events take place throughout the Carnival period, and the popularity of the event is such that the police often close the causeway to the city to prevent overcrowding.

SHOPPING

The main tourist gifts to take home from Venice are Carnival masks and glassware. Numerous shops selling Carnival masks and costumes can be found throughout the city. I bought a velvet-lined mask with bells on from Alberto Sarria Masks on Ruga Rialto in the San Polo region of the city [Telephone: (041) 520 72 78], which cost 135,000 Italian lira (about £40 then). Most mask shops will allow you to watch them making the masks, and have an unbelievably large stock!

Glassware is available throughout the city, and prices vary enormously. If you want to make sure you're getting proper Murano glassware, ask for a certificate to prove its origin. Even if your budget is very tight, you're sure to be able to pick up something made of glass cheaply, even if it's just a little glass animal.

Also worth bringing back are pasta shapes (available in more colours than you'd probably ever imagined), pannetone (Italian light yeast cake, flavoured with vanilla), amaretto biscuits, and chocolates.

TOURIST ATTRACTIONS

Venice has a lot of tourist attractions across the city, plenty to keep visitors busy for around five days. If you're there any longer than that, you'll probably want to travel to some of the surrounding islands, or explore the Veneto region of the mainland.

- Dorsoduro

Dorsoduro is the southernmost region of the city of Venice. Probably the best known buildings in the area are the Dogana di Mare and the neighbouring Santa Maria della Salute church, which are at the easternmost tip of the region - marking the entrance to the Grand Canal. The church is well worth visiting for the beautiful paintings by Titian on the altarpiece and ceiling.

West of these is the Peggy Guggenheim collection, which is on the north side of the Dorsoduro region alongside the Grand Canal. The Peggy Guggenheim collection is a wonderful introduction to modern art, with a lot of works collected by Peggy herself, including several by her one-time husband Max Ernst.

Further to the West is the Accademia gallery, with its outstanding collection of Venetian Renaissance paintings, including Carpaccio's impressive Cycle of St Ursula. It's worth getting to the Accademia as early in the day as you can manage, because the queues for the gallery can get very long in the afternoon.

West of this is the Palazzo Ca'Rezzonico, one of the city's most impressive Baroque palaces, which holds one of the few Canalettos in Venice. A little further west along the Rio di San Barnaba from the palazzo is the Campo San Barnaba, where a barge selling vegetables moors each weekday. It's a fairly unremarkable square, however, a nearby bridge across the canal - the Ponte dei Pugni - is notable. This bridge is marked out with footprints, marking the starting points of rival factions that used to regularly fight here, until the battles were banned in 1705.

- San Polo

North of Dorsoduro, west of the Grand Canal, San Polo is the location of two of the city's markets - the Pescheria, selling fish, and the Erberia selling fruit and vegetables. It's an interesting area of the city to wander round, with a lot of shops.

Most tourists are most interested in the Rialto Bridge, the middle (and best-known) of the three bridges across the Grand Canal, which connects San Polo with San Marco. The central section of the Rialto Bridge is lined with shops selling horrific over-priced trinkets for tourists.

- San Marco

Most of the city's tourist attractions can be found in the San Marco region. Roughly in the centre of the area, just off the Campo Manin, is the Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo, best known for its impressive external spiral staircase.

From here, walking southeast leads towards the Piazza San Marco through the Frezzeria - a shopping street where citizens used to purchase their arrows in Medieval times, but is now home to the city's more exclusive fashion shops.

The Piazza San Marco is frequently flooded, and numerous efforts have been made to ensure that when this happens, the water can be drained off as quickly as possible. Further plans are currently being drawn up to prevent flooding in future. However, in the mean time, duckboards are often left across the Piazza, upon which tourists can walk when the square is flooded.

The Piazza San Marco itself boasts the Museo Correr, in the building around the west, north and south sides of the square - a huge museum of Venetian art. In the southeast corner of the square is the Campanile - a tall belltower, the top of which affords excellent views out over the city. There's a lift to the top, so there's no need to worry about climbing steps! The eastern end of the square is dominated by the Basilica San Marco, which is absolutely stunning to visit - particularly if you visit after dark, when the gold-covered interior shines by candlelight.

On the south side of the Piazza San Marco is Florian's café, a stunningly expensive bar, which used to be regularly visited by literary figures from the 19th century including Byron, Dickens and Proust. Worth a look for the opulence, but probably not worth the time spent queueing to get in, or the cost of a drink!

To the south of the Basilica San Marco is the Doge's Palace, which is a stunningly impressive piece of Gothic architecture. Touring the palace takes most of a day, and is an essential part of a visit to the city, with the palace's beautiful colonnade and the stunning Sala del Maggior Consiglio. The Palace also boasts some superb paintings by Bosch.

Part of the Doge's Palace is the Bridge of Sighs, which connects the palace to the neighbouring prison. The interior of the bridge really isn't that remarkable - the best views are to be had from the Ponte della Paglia, to the east of the Doge's palace.

Beside the Doge's Palace are the columns of San Marco and San Teodoro, a pair of columns which marked the main entrance to the city in the days when it could only be reached by sea.

- Cannaregio

The Cannaregio region to the north of the city has little to attract tourists, other than its beautiful architecture... and the lack of tourists. It's worth making the trip for the Madonna dell'Orto church to see Tintoretto's enormous paintings on the walls.

Also, the Ghetto, the area of the city to which Jews were confined in the city's past, is worth a visit. This area was actually responsible for introducing the word 'ghetto' to the language - the island was named after a foundry ('geto' in Venetian) that used to occupy the site.

CONCLUSIONS

Venice is a truly unique place, with its canals and narrow alleyways. Most of the city seems to have been untouched by time, and walking around the city is a truly magical experience. The city does become very crowded with tourists in the Summer, however, when I visited in Winter, despite how busy most of the hotels seemed to be, there did not seem to be an excessive number of tourists.

While visiting the city could easily be very expensive, it is possible to visit Venice relatively cheaply, by keeping to less expensive restaurants and choosing not to go on a gondola. Booking your accommodation long in advance is also highly recommended, giving you a far wider choice of places to stay.

The city boasts an incomparable collection of Renaissance art galleries, and some extremely beautiful buildings. I don't think I know anyone who hasn't been completely enchanted by the city of Venice - it's such a beautiful and romantic city, it's no wonder people want to come back again and again.