Travel Tips: Venice & Lido Italy

August 05, 2021

Travel Tips: Venice & Lido Italy

An archipelago of 100's of islands, Venice truly is and architectural wonder. How the thousands of houses, and buildings and entire modern life runs within the maze of passage and walkways is understandable but all on water? The Adriatic sea runs throughout all its canals and surrounding islands and although it was hot at the end of July as Italy always is, travelling everywhere by boat on the public transport water buses keeps you cool.

In front of Doge's palace at water's edge

Flying over Venice arriving at Marco Polo airport is amazing. The whole layout of islands looks like a maze from above. As luck would have it, Corona measures everywhere, it was absolutely no fun wearing a mask continually. In fact the only place you could take if off was in the smoker's lounge! But I had flown not via my booked direct flight but via Charles de Gaulle, Paris because I heard three days before the flight that it had been cancelled. I figured due to Corona rules somewhere, but no. The flight was kept for the same date but later and not direct because Italian air traffic controllers were on strike! Viva Italia haha!So all the vaccination papers, apps, and passport were not even checked. I am happy though that it was fresh and cool because the 45 minute ride on the blue line Alilaguna from the airport was cool. 7kms a hour and what an introduction to the waterways of this unique place.

I stayed in Lido and if you hate crowds it's the best thing to do. I bought a 72 hour public waterbus pass so you can hop across to Venice and any island when you feel like it. Early morning was the best before the heat of the day and sunset walking on Lido were my general routine. I was 3 minutes from the Lido beach in Air BnB which was nice, but my, the Italians are noisy and like the Spanish, the evening only begins for them at 2230. So beware!

Lido is lovely and also has canals plus plenty of restaurants and cafes along the long island beach with cool walkways under trees on the road side. On the other side where the water buses run, you have the perfect view of Venice from not to far. It's a couple of stops. Giardini with a park and lovely restaurant/cafe, plus a few more and you can off right at St Mark's Square or a few before that and walk in over the many of Venice's 100's of bridges.

On St Mark's square there were not that many tourists as before a long time ago when I was there. However, the groups of tourists are arriving and the queues for Doge's Palace and St Mark's are at least a kilometre long. I can't stand waiting so I took the Campenile instead which queue was short and the views are spectacular. You can see St Georgio across the bay and all the dome roofs of St Marks, plus the many red roof tops.

The Campenile

St Mark's Square

Saint Georgio from the Campenile

The waterbus all the way to Plaza de Rome brings you to the train station and about 20 minutes before that is the famous Rialto bridge. You can walk along the water or dare to take the inner maze which has quiet pedestrian only streets with shops and homes, plus a few squares, always canals, gondolas and bridges. Venice is naturally famous for the perfectly symmetrical architecture of Palladio. There are few square or rectangle windows anywhere on any building, most being decorated in either Baroque or Gothic style.