Venice is open to tourists – and it’s a steal
The first year of the pandemic drained Italy of its foreign tourists. Visitors are streaming back now, and one of the country’s top destinations is unusually serene and affordable.
The click-clack of suitcases being rolled along the cobblestone alleyways is back. So too is the occasional pause in the luggage cacophony when tourists lift their bags to lug them up and down this city’s endless succession of bridges. But while Venice has once again become a busy tourist destination, the city reveals two tales.
On the weekends, you need fancy footwork and aggressive elbowing to get a prime viewing spot of the Grand Canal from the Rialto Bridge. On weekdays, Venice still preserves some of the relative tranquillity that characterised it during the pandemic. An unobstructed view of the Bridge of Sighs can be had without any manoeuvring and the crowds in the alleyways near St Mark’s Square vanish quickly.
According to the most recent government data available, Venice welcomed about 60 per cent fewer tourists in June and July of this year than in the same two months of 2019. But while the number of foreigners dropped by 70 per cent in those two months, almost 50 per cent more Italian tourists came to Venice, many on weekend day trips.
As Italy’s tourist destination par excellence, Venice has become a bellwether for the country and Europe more broadly. What happens here is likely happening to some degree in Rome, Paris and Barcelona.
In Italy and across Europe, tourism activity in August and September was about 70 per cent of the level in 2019, according to Tomas Dvorak, an economist with Oxford Economics. That is an improvement for most of Europe and is a relief for Italy, where tourism revenue fell 50 per cent last year, according to Oxford Economics.
“We are still a long way from where we were in 2019, but that’s okay because right now I’m just happy we are working,” says Giulia Zanon, co-owner with her brother of a pub on a Venetian canal flanked by bars and restaurants.
Italy’s long and strict lockdown, the first in Europe, began in early March of 2020 and ground Venice and the rest of the country to almost a complete stop. Venice registered 667 overnight visitors in April 2020, down from 488,000 in the same month of 2019.
In Italy, the number of new infections has been falling since August. More than three-quarters of the population has received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine. Australians arriving in the country will likely need to show proof of their vaccination status and have a recent negative Covid test result. To enter most indoor spaces in Italy, including restaurants, bars, museums and churches, you must wear a mask and show the country’s so-called green pass – which attests that the holder is vaccinated, recently tested negative or has recovered from Covid. It’s likely Australia’s vaccination certificates will be accepted by authorities in lieu of the green pass.
While the number of foreign tourists arriving in Venice has been inching up since the spring, shop owners are missing the non-European visitors who tend to stay longer and spend more. Shareef Kanzad is especially missing the Americans, Koreans and Russians, all big buyers of the handmade traditional Venetian masks she has been selling in her shop for 22 years.
“I’m optimistic – as a business owner you have to be,” says Kanzad. “But we have learned during this pandemic that things change quickly and not always as you expect them to.”
That optimism isn’t shared by Emanuele Tagliapietra, who has been a gondolier for more than three decades and says that, apart from last year, it’s never been this bad. He and the other gondoliers work two days followed by three days off, compared with three on and two off before the pandemic.
“How is business? Look at all these gondolas here, that’s your answer,” says Tagliapietra, pointing to a long row of docked gondolas bobbing in the Venetian lagoon behind him.
During the summer, many four-star hotels had double rooms going for about €150 ($236) a night, about half what they fetched in the summer of 2019, says Vittorio Bonacini, the chairman of Associazione Veneziana Albergatori, which represents about 85 per cent of the city’s hotels. He is expecting three and four-star hotels to adhere to similar price reductions to the end of the year. Currently, hotels are at about 35 per cent occupancy during the week and 65 per cent on weekends.
The city is still adjusting to the Italian government’s decision in July to forbid large cruise ships from passing near or docking at Venice’s historic centre (see story at right). The city is evaluating how to implement a plan next year to have tourists who come for the day pay an entry fee, the price of which will depend on how many visitors are expected on a particular day.
While most of Venice’s attractions aren’t yet seeing pre-pandemic levels of visitors again, the architectural Biennale is an exception. The Biennale, for which countries send artists to exhibit in pavilions, is on track to draw more visitors than ever before. The sprawling, partly outdoor exhibition, one of the first large-scale events in Italy since the start of the pandemic, shuts down on November 21 after a six-month run. Tickets are still plentiful for all days, including weekends. “We showed that with the right precautions, big events can be safe,” says Roberto Cicutto, the Biennale’s chairman. “That’s a message for the whole country.”
But as the pandemic persists, tourists continue to face challenges, as Helen Di Folco found out this month. She and her husband flew from Toronto to Venice for a week-long trip in Italy, starting with a 24-hour stay in Venice followed by a bike trip on Italy’s Adriatic coast. They got stuck in Heathrow Airport in London for eight hours after missing their connecting flight due to long Covid-control lines. Their stay in Venice was squeezed into an evening and a morning.
“When we booked in May we thought things would get better as time passed and that by summer it would be all clear,” says Di Folco. “Then Delta happened.”
While the number of tourists is still well below 2019 levels, nationwide limits on the number of people allowed in closed spaces and the influx of weekend day-trippers have led to long lines. Tickets have sold out on weekends for certain venues.
When Valentine Bourdariat and Antoine Lafargue visited from Paris on a recent weekend, dauntingly long lines at the Doge’s Palace and Saint Mark’s Basilica made them revise their plans and head off instead to the Guggenheim Museum, only to be turned away. The Guggenheim and the Doge’s Palace take reservations.
“I never thought you’d have to reserve to get into the Guggenheim, but that’s okay, we are just happy to be here,” says Bourdariat. “It can be a hassle with the documents, figuring out what the Covid rules are in a different country, but once you are here it’s all worth it.”
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In the know
Land-based tours with Venice in the mix:
Academy Travel’s 15-day City, Republic and Empire tour offers an in-depth look at the city that presided over the Mediterranean for 1000 years. Guests will explore by boat and on foot, delving into the history, art, culture and economy of this vibrant metropolis. Also included are day trips to Ravenna with its glittering mosaics, Padua with its remarkable Giotto collection in Scrovegni Chapel, and the villas of Palladio. Departures in October 2022, and March and October 2023; $8970 a person, twin-share.
Abercrombie & Kent has a small-group journey that calls at Rome, Florence and Venice over eight days. The Italian Treasures tour includes a visit to Vatican City, a tasting of Tuscany’s Brunello di Montalcino and a train ride across the Apennines to Venice. Apart from the city’s main sights, guests have the option to step inside a gondola workshop, observe textile weavers at work and explore film locations. Departures from April 1, 2022; from $12,155 a person, twin-share.
Hidden Italy’s Venice and Italian Lakes walking tour takes guests through the back canals of Venice, along historic trails above Lake Como and into the arcades of Turin. Seven guided walks, ranging from 8-12km, feature in the 13-day itinerary, with lodgings in boutique properties plus a 400-year-old hikers hotel over the border in Switzerland. Departs August 26, 2022; $7110 a person, twin-share.
Butterfield & Robinson has an easy six-day guided cycling tour from Venice to Verona, starting on the Venetian island of Pellestrina. Pretty riverside hamlets, vine-clad hillsides and stunning views of Lake Garda are among the attractions on this sojourn, mostly along flat and quiet country roads and bike paths. From $US6495 ($8770) a person, twin-share; single supplement $US1000; departures from May to September 2022.
Insight Vacations’ Best of Italy package is a greatest-hits 11-day round-trip from Rome that includes two nights in Venice. Guests cruise the canals by private boat and gondola and have the option to see artisan glassblowers in action. Other highlights include tours of Rome’s Sistine Chapel and the rarely seen Bramante Staircase in the Vatican, and visits to the leather workers of Florence and the Isle of Capri. From $4075 a person, twin-share; departures from March 3, 2022.
PENNY HUNTER
