Venice Travel Guide: What to See and Do in Venice
General Information of Venice
Venice is a city in northeastern Italy known for its architecture and canals. It was founded in the 5th century and is considered one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Known as "La Serenissima", Venice was an important commercial and cultural center during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
The city center is made up of more than 120 islands linked by more than 400 bridges. The canals of Venice are famous for their gondola traffic and for their beauty. The city is also known for its palaces, churches, and squares. Major tourist attractions include St. Mark's Basilica, Doge's Palace, and St. Mark's Square.
Venice is a unique and amazing city, with a rich history and culture. It is famous for its annual carnivals, its music, and its spectacular views. It is an ideal place for travelers looking to explore the history and beauty of Italy. The city is a major tourist center and receives millions of visitors each year.
If you visit Venice for the first time, you arrive full of expectations, most of which are well-founded. As soon as you start exploring Venice, every day will bring surprises, as its crowded cityscape means that you can't walk for a minute without coming across something worth stopping at.
Location of Venice
Below, we show you where the city of Venice is located.
Map of Venice on Google Maps
Main Attractions of Venice
Venice is one of the most beautiful and romantic cities in the world. Known for its canals, bridges, and car-free streets, it offers a wide variety of places of interest to visit. Here are some of the most popular.
Piazza San Marco
This is the most famous square in Venice and is the heart of the city. It houses the Doge's Palace, St. Mark's Basilica, and St. Mark's Campanile, which offers stunning views of the city.
Canals of Venice
The canals are the true charm of Venice. You can explore them on a gondola ride, admire the graceful buildings and the bridges that span them.
The Basilica of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari
This impressive Gothic church is one of the largest in Venice and houses some of the city's most beautiful works of art, including a sculpture by Titian and a funerary monument by Canova.
Peggy Guggenheim Museum
This is one of the most important modern art museums in Venice, housed in an elegant villa on the Giudecca Canal. It offers a wide collection of European and American art of the 20th century.
Doge's Palace
This is the former political center of Venice, and today it is one of the most visited museums in the city. It contains a large collection of art and historical objects that illustrate the history and wealth of Venice.
These are just a few of the many sites of interest that Venice has to offer. Anyone who visits this beautiful city is sure to find many more wonders to discover.
Surroundings of Venice
Tourism is far from the only branch of the economy in Veneto, the surrounding region of which Venice is the capital.
The rich, flat land around the Po supports some of the most productive farms and vineyards in Italy, and industrial development around the major cities rivals even the better-known areas of Milan, making the region one of the richest in Europe
In Marghera, just beyond the Venetian lagoon, Veneto has the country's largest industrial complex, though it is now in decline.
Padua and Verona are the main tourist attractions after Venice, thanks mainly to the former's masterpieces by Giotto and the latter's magnificent medieval historic center.
None of the other cities in Veneto can match the cultural richness of these two, but there are many places that warrant a detour: the Palladian city of Vicenza, for example, the fortified settlements of Castelfranco and Cittadella, and the idyllic highland city of alone.
For lovers of the outdoors, the interesting terrain is in the northern part of Veneto, where the forested slopes of the hills soon give way to the wild precipices of the eastern Dolomites.
Because most of the high peaks of the Dolomites lie within Trentino-Alto Adige, and the eastern Dolomites are more easily explored as part of a tour of the range as a whole, the Veneto area north of Belluno is covered by Trentino-Alto Adige.
Similarly, the eastern shore of Lake Garda is covered as part of Lombardy and the lakes.
Cultural Interest in Venice
Venice's cultural heritage is a source of endless fascination, but you should also allow time to wander: the anonymous parts of the city reveal as much of the city's essence as its outstanding attractions.
Each parish rewards exploration and a list of churches worth visiting would feature more than fifty names, and a list of the important paintings and sculptures they contain would double that.
Two of the distinctively Venetian institutions known as the scuole preserve some of the outstanding examples of Italian Renaissance art: the Scuola di San Rocco, with its sequence of images by Tintoretto, and the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni, decorated with a beautiful sequence of Carpaccio.
Although many of the city's treasures remain in the buildings for which they were created, a considerable number have been moved to Venice's museums. The one not to be missed is the Accademia, an ensemble of Venetian paintings consisting of practically nothing but masterpieces.
What to Eat and Drink in Venice
Venice specializes in fish and shellfish, along with exotic ingredients like pomegranates, pine nuts, and raisins, harkening back to its days as a port and market town. The surrounding Veneto vies with Lombardy for the crown of risottos.
The final product tends to be more liquid than those in the west, usually with a seafood base, although snap peas (bisi in the local dialect) are also common, as are other seasonal vegetables such as spinach, asparagus, and squash.
The red salad-leaf radicchio also has its home in Veneto, as does the famous Italian dessert, tiramisu.
Polenta is also eaten, while pork in all its forms has a strong presence, along with heavy bean, rice and root vegetable soups.
Pastries and sweets are an area of Venetian specialization. Look out for the thin oval cookies called baicoli, the cinnamon-flavored ring-shaped bussolai (a specialty of the Venetian island of Burano) and the mandorlato, a cross between nougat and toffee, made with almonds.
The Veneto has been very successful in developing wines from French and German grape varieties, notably Merlot, Cabernet, Pinot Bianco, Pinot Grigio, Müller-Thurgau, Riesling, Chardonnay, and Gewürztraminer.
The Bardolino, Valpolicella, and Soave, essentially Italian, are all from the Verona area.
In turn, the increasingly popular prosecco is produced in vineyards around Conegliano.
Grappa, the local schnapps, is particularly associated with the highland town of Bassano di Grappa. Made from grape skins, juniper berries, or plums, grappa is a very acquired taste.
How to Get Around in Venice
In Venice, the main means of transportation are gondolas and vaporettos (public boats). You can also walk through its streets and canals.
However, it is important to note that the city is very busy and some areas are overcrowded with tourists, so it can be difficult to get around at times.
It is recommended to plan ahead and consider options such as boat tours through the canals or walks through the less crowded alleys to avoid crowds.
Photo by Henrique Ferreira on Unsplash
In conclusion, Venice is a unique and magical city, full of history, art, and charm. With its streets and canals, impressive architecture, and wonderful restaurants, there is something for everyone in this Italian city.
We hope this guide has been helpful in helping you plan your trip and enjoy all that Venice has to offer.
Do not hesitate to contact us if you have any additional questions about the city or if you need help organizing your trip. Bon viaggio to Venice!
