Venice hotels and accommodation: a comprehensive guide -Part 2

Everything you need to know about Venice hotels from based on my experiences over the past decades

Beautiful view of St. Marco Square -Venice, Italy

Some unwritten rules of Venice Hotels which are worth being aware of:

I love Venice but I know it. I accept it as it is, but there are some things it’s useful to know of and to acknowledge and to prepare for to avoid very unpleasant surprised. And don’t forget: you ought to sleep in Venice at least once. So let me help you to choose the best hotel for doing so.

Everything is a „Hotel” in Venice

Those of you, travelers, who went across Western Europe’s countries, such as Belgium, Germany, Austria, Switzerland or France before visiting Venice, you will realize how spoiled you had been so far. You got earnest information in those places about the place about the services about the quality. Well, in Venice the thing is, everything is relative. Finding the excuse of „oldness” even a very used shackle sort of a building can be christened to become a „Hotel” asking plenty of money giving you bed and breakfast (more on breakfast later). So, get in the review sections of travelers’ sites: I like TripAdvisor because they publish the tourists’ own photos too. And prepare to lower your expectations.  

Forget about proper star ratings

In Venice, hotel ratings are absolutely random. This is also true for most of Italy’s resort cities by the way. Mostly if a hotel has its own kitchen then it’s automatically a 3-4 star hotel. If it has a patio or if its by a canal (especially the Grand Canal) then it instantly turns into a 4-5 star hotel. Those, who like me have learned on the correct star ratings, may feel to start crying at this point. But don’t do it. You are in Venice after all.

Italy hotels and the constant problem of the breakfast

Now, this will be a funny one, but one you definitely need to get prepared for, especially if you come from a country with richer than rich breakfast culture (such as Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland: I’ve had some of the VERY BEST breakfasts in my life in these countries!!) so, the matter of the fact is, that Italian hotels don’t serve a quality breakfast. Normally, Italians don’t care too much for breakfast apart from having a strong coffee. I can count the Italian hotels on one finger where I had a proper breakfast (Thank you Hotel Loreley J ).

The 4 Star hotel I’ve been to in Venice barely had anything to offer for breakfast. Some others didn’t offer any at all.  The Venice hotels which actually care to give a so-so to fair quality breakfast probably start at 4-5 Star rating (maybe that’s why) but still don’t expect that breakfast to take you through the day.

This phenomenon is very interesting and it’s something I have experienced so many times when I was in Venice or in any other place in Italy. And on the other hand Italian cafés are full of cakes, croissants, tramezzinis, and breads of 20 types. Greece is also the South without much of a breakfast culture but at least in return they give you tons of feta cheese with unlimited supplies of tomato, olives, cucumber and bread. This is also the way hotels do in Turkey. So why can’t Italy adapt? I honestly think maybe they just don’t care.

Halfboard is non existant: Italy hotels somehow don't provide hald-board and this situation is not different in Venice either. So get prepared for a restaurant hunt in the evening.

Venice Hotel Rates are greatly affected by location:

Well, this is no big news and takes no rocket science to understand. Of course accommodation has always been affected by close by lying attractions.

Venice by night: along Grand Canal

In Venice this means the following:

• The most expensive hotels are along the line of Grand Canal
• The closer you get to Rialto and San Marco square, the most expensive a hotel gets
• Hotels close to the official big tourist route are the most expensive
• Hotels close to a nice canal

So, how can you find good deals for Venice Hotels?

Well this is an ever ongoing dispute. I would say to follow the travel blogs and most importantly visit the travel forums like the ones TripAdvisor or LonelyPlanet has. There are some rare catches! But it’s not easy to find them if you are using a standard booking website. I will do my best to help you with this and will represent you with some rare catches shortly.

Venice hotels and the constant struggle with space

Everyone knows Venice is small and that it’s constantly dealing with sinking issues. With the whole island being a World Heritage on top of that one thing is for sure: there are only very few places where property is more expensive than in Venice. That’s why houses and hotels most often than not have no garden or only a small one. The number of Exclusive 5 star hotels with a garden is only a few. I have no knowledge of any hotel having a swimming pool in Venice (but I will check this out and put my findings in this article later on as an update). What I really wanted to refer to, is that the majority of hotels are small and so are the rooms, no matter how you put it plus most hotels have no elevator either for this very reason. If you want spacey rooms, wait for my next article that will present you with alternate accommodation solutions. 

Space is a constant issue in Venice

Please share your own Venice stories good or bad. If you have a favorite hotel let me know about it. I'd be glad to hear from you all! 

Next part I promise will be more practical on finding the best hotels and accommodation in Venice. I want to introduce you to some of my most favorites.