When I was traveling in Sicily, I met a girl from Venice. She suggested the best things for me to do when I got there was to purchase a 72-hour Vaporetto ticket. A Vaporetto is a water bus. The service is pretty frequent just about anywhere you want to go. If you want to go down the smaller canals, you can rent a gondola. If you want a more romantic trip, you can get a private gondola tour.
However, once you are on the main island of Venice, walking is the only way to go. There are many bridges that go up and over each of the canals, so even having a bike is really not practical. The lack of motorbikes, cars and other means of transport makes the streets so much better. I wish more of Italy were like this.
Venice is very damp throughout most of the year. I bought a waterproof map, which was used many, many times. I kept getting lost. It’s easy to do with the dense fog that seemed to envelope the city for 3 of the days I was there. Somehow, I kept making my way back to San Marco each time.
