The Rough Guide to Venice and the Veneto

BASICS
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Travel essentials
of model boats in the Museo Storico Navale,
and a few prehistoric skeletons in the Museo
Storico Naturale (only part of which is currently
open), but otherwise it’s mostly paintings.
Diet might also be an issue in seafoodcentric
Venice – many restaurants offer kids’
favourites such as lasagne and spaghetti
Bolognese, but many do not. And if you’re
going to be pushing a buggy around all day,
the endless bridges can become wearying.
On the other hand, anyone equipped with a
baby is very likely to be warmly received in
child-mad Italy, and restaurants won’t treat
the small ones as an occupational hazard
– quite the opposite. As for accommodation,
nearly all hotels will gladly put a cot or
an extra bed in your room, usually for a surcharge
of around ten percent.
Travel essentials
26
Costs
There is no getting round the fact that Venice
is a fantastically expensive city. If you’re on
the least luxurious of expeditions – camping,
walking wherever possible, cooking your
own food – it would be possible to get by
on around £25/US$50 a day. Assuming,
though, that you share a double room in a
one-star hotel, eat out in the evenings, and
go to a museum each day, your minimum
will be twice that amount. Even in the dead
of winter there are very few double rooms in
Venice costing less than e60 – that’s £40/
US$75 per person, and a strict diet of coffee
and croissant (cornetto) in the mornings, a
picnic at lunchtime and pizza in the evening
will account for another £20/US$40 at least.
Add onto this the cost of the odd entrance
fee and boat ticket, and you’ve passed
the £50/US$95 mark before you know it.
Allowing for the occasional excursion onto
the mainland and other contingencies, it’s
reasonable to budget for a basic outlay of
£60/US$115/€90 per person per day for
a summer trip to Venice. However, if you
want to enjoy the occasional special meal
or do a bit of shopping without worrying
that your money will run out before the end
of your holiday, you should set aside about
£40/US$75/€60 per day as your spending
money, not counting accommodation
costs. And don’t forget that, as ever, costs
are higher for the person travelling alone:
for single rooms, you’d be doing well to find
anything for less than 75 percent of the cost
of a double room.
Youth/student ID cards soon pay for themselves
in savings. Full-time students are eligible
for the International Student ID Card
(ISIC; wwww.isic.org), which entitles the
bearer to discounts for transport, museums,
theatres and other attractions. For Americans
there’s also a health benefit, providing up to
US$3000 in emergency medical coverage
and US$100 a day for 60 days in the hospital,
plus a 24-hour hotline to call in the event
of a medical, legal or financial emergency.
The card costs $22 in the USA; Can$16 in
Canada; Aus$18 in Australia; NZ$20 in New
Zealand; £7 in the UK; and EU$13 in the
Republic of Ireland. You only have to be 26
or younger to qualify for the International
Youth Travel Card, which costs the same
and carries the same benefits.
If you are thinking of splashing out on a
designer outfit or some other expensive item,
bear in mind that visitors from outside the EU
are entitled to an IVA (purchase tax) rebate
on single items valued at over e154.94. The
procedure is to get a full receipt from the
shop, describing the purchase in detail. This
receipt must be presented to customs on your
return home, and then sent back to the shop
within ninety days of the date of the receipt;
the shop will then refund the IVA component
of the price, a saving of eighteen percent.