Venice DIRECTIONS
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Venice DIRECTIONS WRITTEN AND RESEARCHED BY Jonathan Buckley NEW YORK • LONDON • DELHI www.roughguides.com 2 Tips for reading this e-book Your e-book Reader has many options for viewing and navigating through an e-book. Explore the dropdown menus and toolbar at the top and the status bar at the bottom of the display window to familiarize yourself with these. The following guidelines are provided to assist users who are not familiar with PDF files. For a complete user guide, see the Help menu of your Reader. • You can read the pages in this e-book one at a time, or as two pages facing each other, as in a regular book. To select how you’d like to view the pages, click on the View menu on the top panel and choose the Single Page, Continuous, Facing or Continuous – Facing option. • You can scroll through the pages or use the arrows at the top or bottom of the display window to turn pages. You can also type a page number into the status bar at the bottom and be taken directly there. 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For more tips, check out Adobe’s frequently asked questions for e-book users by clicking here. 3 Contents Eastern Castello ......................................................124 Introduction 4 CONTENTS The Canal Grande ..................................................131 The northern islands ..........................................140 The southern islands..........................................148 Ideas 9 The big six ..........................................................................10 Accommodation 155 The main islands ........................................................12 Venice viewpoints......................................................14 Hotels....................................................................................157 Byzantine Venice ........................................................16 Apartments ....................................................................162 Hostels ................................................................................163 Museums and art galleries ............................18 Renaissance architecture ................................20 Eighteenth-century art ........................................22 Essentials 165 Shops and markets..................................................24 Death in Venice ............................................................26 Arrival....................................................................................167 Information ....................................................................167 Renaissance painting ............................................28 City transport ..............................................................168 On the water ....................................................................30 Museums and monuments ........................171 Venetian oddities ........................................................32 Festivals and special events ....................172 Multicultural Venice ................................................34 Directory............................................................................174 Scuole ......................................................................................36 Authentic Venice..........................................................38 Food and drink ..............................................................40 Language 177 Music in Venice ............................................................42 Crime and punishment........................................44 Festivals ................................................................................46 Useful Stuff 184 Places 49 Index 185 San Marco: the Piazza ........................................51 San Marco: North of the Piazza ..............63 San Marco: West of the Piazza ................69 Colour Maps Dorsoduro ..........................................................................76 San Polo and Santa Croce ............................89 Venice Cannaregio ....................................................................104 San Marco Central Castello ........................................................114 Main Water Bus Services 4 Introduction to Venice INTRODUCTION Founded 1500 years ago on a cluster of mudflats in the centre of the lagoon,Venice rose to become Europe’s main trading post between the West and the East, and at its height controlled an empire that extended from the Dolomites to Cyprus.The melancholic air of the place is in part a product of the discrepancy between the grandeur of its history and what the city has become. In the heyday of the Rialto dictated the value Venetian Republic, some of commodities all over 200,000 people lived in the continent; in the dock- Venice, three times its pres- yards of the Arsenale the ent population. Merchants workforce was so vast that from Europe and western a warship could be built Asia maintained warehous- and fitted out in a single es here; transactions in the day; and the Piazza San banks and bazaars of the Marco was thronged with people here to set up deals or report to the Republic’s government. Nowadays it’s no longer a buzzing metropolis but rather the embodiment of a fabulous past, dependent for its sur- vival largely on the people who come to marvel at its relics. The monuments which draw the largest crowds are the Basilica di San Marco – the mausoleum of the city’s patron saint – and the Palazzo Ducale or Doge’s Contents Introduction 5 INTRODUCTION ĭ A Cannaregio canal view A Cannaregio Palace. Certainly these are itineraries for a day and just the most imposing struc- wander – the anonymous tures in the city, but a roll- parts of Venice reveal as call of the churches worth much of the city as its well- visiting would feature more known attractions. than a dozen names. Many of the city’s treasures remain The Piazzetta in the churches for which they were created, but a sizeable number have been removed to one or other of Venice’s museums, with the Accademia holding the lion’s share.This cultural heritage is a source of end- less fascination, but you should also discard your Contents Introduction 6 When to visit Venice’s tourist season is very nearly an all-year affair. Peak season, when hotel rooms are virtually impossible to come by at short notice, is from April to October; try to avoid July and August in particular, when the climate becomes oppressively hot and clammy. The other two popular spells are the Carnevale (leading up to Lent) and the weeks on each side of Christmas. For the ideal combination of comparative peace and a mild climate, the two or three weeks immediately preceding Easter is perhaps the best time of year. Climatically the months at the end of the high season are somewhat INTRODUCTION less reliable: some November and December days bring fogs that make it difficult to see from one bank of the Canal Grande to the other. If you want to see the city at its quietest, January is the month to go – take plenty of warm clothes, though, as the winds of the Adriatic can be savage, and you should be prepared for floods throughout the winter. This acqua alta,as Venice’s seasonal flooding is called, has been an element of Venetian life for centuries, but nowadays it’s far more frequent than it used to be: between October and late February it’s not uncommon for flooding to occur every day of the week, and it’ll be a long time before the huge flood bar- rier (which was begun in 2003) makes any impact. However, having lived with it for so long, the city is well geared to dealing with the nuisance. Shopkeepers in the most badly affected areas insert steel shutters into their doorways to hold the water at bay, while the local council lays jetties of duck-boards along the major thoroughfares and between the chief vaporetto stops and dry land. İ Reflection of gondolas in the Bacino Orseolo Contents Introduction 7 VENICE AT A GLANCE İ INTRODUCTION The historic centre of The Basilica di San Marco Venice is made up of 118 islands, tied together by some 400 bridges to form an amalgamation that’s divided into six large administrative districts known as sestieri, three on each side of the Canal Grande. San Marco The sestiere of San Marco is the hub of the city, being the location of the two prime monuments – the Palazzo Ducale and the Basilica di San Marco – and the city’s highest concentration of shops and hotels. İ The San Barnaba district Dorsoduro Lying on the opposite side of the Canal Grande from San Marco, and stretching westward to the docks, Dorsoduro is one of the city’s smartest quarters, as well