One Day in Venice
We spent the last day of our trip to Slovenia in Venice. We had flown in and out of Venice, since it is not a long drive over to Bled and the flights were better priced for when we were traveling than flying to the closer airport in Trieste (still in Italy but right near the border with Slovenia). It worked out nicely though because somehow, even after living here for over two years, we still had not made it up to Venice. Here is how we spent one day to make the most of it.
We already had a rental car, since we were driving back from Slovenia. We considered dropping it off at the airport, storing our luggage, and then taking the ferry from the airport to Venice, but it seemed like it would just eat up too much time in an already short visit. We pre-booked a parking spot at Garage San Marco and were set. From here, it was an easy walk into the city. In early November, we had fantastic weather (sunny and just a little chilly) and low crowds, which I think made us love the city even more. I can see how this city with intense, peak season crowds would feel a bit suffocating. True to how we like to travel, our plan involved a GoogleMap list of major sites we wanted to pass by on a walk (we obviously wanted to see things like the Ponte Rialto, Ponte dei Sospiri, etc), a few pinned restaurants, and 1-2 “activities” we wanted to shoot for (usually something like a hike, a boat ride, a museum visit — something along those lines).
I will say that doing the gondola ride was absolutely worth it. Actually being on the canals was so cool and seeing the buildings from the water, back more in the residential canals and away from the Grand Canal, was really unique. We tried to grab a gondola from Campo San Barnaba, based on recommendations of this being a good location to start from, but no gondoliers passed by when we were in this area. So we continued on and just grabbed the first gondola we saw. The price is set by the city of Venice and varies only based on how long of a ride you want. We opted for the longer ride, which I’m glad we did as it allowed for more time away from the more congested areas.
After our gondola ride, we spent the day wandering. We ate gelato, had a great lunch at a spot I can’t even remember because it was a hole in the wall, and covered as much distance as we could. It was a fantastic way to spend time before our flight and we honestly fell in love with this beautiful city.
A few tips:
One of the most debated topics among parents seems to be stroller or no stroller. I wore my 3 year old in a carrier or he walked. I did not want to deal with carrying the stroller up and down the stairs for all of the bridges (there are 435-438 in the city) that we would have to walk over.
Be careful of speed cameras if you are driving around Venice. We know of multiple people who got tickets when they visited (my partner included).
When we picked up our rental car (rented through ItalyCarRent), they would not rent to us with our Indiana driver’s licenses because they say “operator license” instead of “driver’s license.” We have International Driver’s Permits that we provided and that didn’t matter. Luckily, we were able to walk down to Hertz and get a (much more expensive) rental, but this was a weird thing specific just to Indiana licenses.
Fantastic Resources for Venice:
Row Venice: Row Venice is a non-profit organization of passionate women and expert vogatrici, Venetian by birth and by choice. We are dedicated to the preservation of the traditional Venetian cultura acquea and at its center, the voga alla veneta, the Venetian style of rowing: standing up, facing forward, native to Venice and made iconic by the gondoliers. Many of us are also athletes and regatanti, racing all season long and devoted to this Venetian sport that’s as old as the city itself.
Italy with Kids Facebook group: This group, run by a mom from Rome who runs the Mama Loves Italy blog (linked below) is amazing for any Italy travels and has a ton of crowd-sourced advice to help plan a Venice trip.
Mama Loves Italy: This blog has given me so many idea for trips we have done around Italy