We'll arrive at the Santa Lucia Station in late afternoon. Hopefully, many of the day visitors will be back on their ships by then so it won't be too crowded. We can buy our vaporetto passes at the Ferrovia Station (a 72 hour pass is €33). That's the good news.
The bad news is that we likely have stairs to exit the tracks and get into the station. We can try this and we might be able to avoid some stairs.
But we still have a good hike to the hotel from the station. We can see it from there, but we will have to walk to the bridge, lug our stuff over the bridge stairs, and then walk to the hotel. We'll use the bridge to our left as we exit, the Scalzi Bridge. It is full of stairs and a little walk on the other side to the hotel. No way around it, we have to cross a bridge with stairs and suitcases.
So we'll check into our hotel as quickly as possible, grab a medicinal beverage at the bar (those stairs across the Grand Canal WILL make us sick), and then head off to explore.
This will be a good time of the day to take a full round vapoetto cruise of Venice. Our closest vaporetto stop is across the Grand Canal at the Ferrovia Station. Every line stops here, so in that, we're lucky! I'd suggest we take Line 2 which goes down the Grand Canal and then around and up the Giudecca Canal. Or, we take Line 41/42 which goes all around Venice (minus the Grand Canal) and goes out to the beautiful island of Murano before heading back to Venice itself.
If we time it just right, we'll be motoring back to Venice just as the setting sun dramatically backlights the teetering bell towers of the city and throws sparkling streamers across the waters of the lagoon.Either would be a nice way to get one's bearings. If we see anything interesting, we just hop off and check it out.
For dinner, we can either ask for a suggestion from the hotel staff (they have NEVER steered us wrong!), or we can hunt around and find a cute little place on our own.
The next two days are up to us. Whatever we feel like seeing doing, eating, or drinking is fine by me!
There are must-sees in Venice, and we will see them, after all Venice is not that big. But the best thing is to wander, get lost, veer away from the tourist areas, and see the real Venice. It is so interesting to see how people live, move to a new house, have a washing machine delivered, get picked up by an ambulance, and have their garbage removed - all by boat! We want to get lost - we'll stroll past slowly decaying Gothic palaces decorated with pointy Byzantine windows, stumble across pocket-sized campielli (squares) where local kids are kicking a soccer ball around a medieval well, and then we can duck into the shade of a tiny bar to share a glass of wine with the well-weathered locals.
Some Must Sees in Venice:
The Accademia Gallery for its stupendous collection of Old Masters paintings;
The nearby Peggy Guggenheim Museum for one of Europe's best galleries of early modern works from the 20th century, and a wonderful sculpture garden;
The Ca' Rezzonico, another historic patrician palace restored with a small painting gallery;
Scuola Grande di San Rocco and the Tintoretto paintings;
The Ca' d'Oro, a glorious private palace on the Grand Canal now turned into a museum and art gallery;
The Piazza San Marco to listen to the dueling trios playing for the tables in front of competing chic cafes;The Basilica di San Marco to see its treasures and the thousands of square feet of glittering mosaics swathing its interior;
The Doge's Palace "Secret Itineraries" tour for an insider's glimpse into the hidden offices, courtrooms, archives, and prisons from which the true Venetian Republic ruled for 900 years;
The Bridge of Sighs where condemned prisoners had their last view of the world;
The Rialto Bridge and its markets and shops;
Murano, a miniature Venice and home to the lagoon's famed glass-blowing workshops;
Burano, a quiet fishing village famous for its hand-tatted lace and for the eye-popping, super-saturated, wonderfully clashing colors of its houses; To best avoid the tourist crowds, head deep into the residential neighborhoods of Castello (especially in the eastern half); northern Cannaregio, especially the Ghetto (the medieval Jewish quarter); and La Giudecca, another large Venetian island not connected to the rest by any bridge;
