Ultimate Guide to Venice with Kids
Venice with kids is always a good idea. It’s hard to imagine a city more thrilling to visit with children than Venice. This, after all, is a city on the water where even the ambulances and rubbish trucks are boats. Most of the buildings are palaces and there are winged lions and dragons around every corner.
Venice is a joy to explore with children. Wander down the less touristy backstreets and you’ll find tiny canals and little bridges to run across. There are ice-cream shops on almost every street and you can learn how to row a gondola and paint a Venetian mask.
Here’s our guide to exploring Venice with kids, with lots of ideas of things to see and do as well as tips on avoiding queues.
Arrive by boat
Travel around by boat
A one-way ticket on the vaporetti costs €7.50. It can work out cheaper buying a one-day travel card for €20 which lasts for 24 hours from its first use. Children under 6 travel for free.
Avoid the queues at St Mark’s Square
I hate queues nearly as much as my children so we’re always looking at ways to avoid them. There’s no getting away from the fact that Venice is an extremely popular city to visit and you’re likely to face queues at many of the top attractions. But there are things you can do to avoid the worst of the queues. And the answer is often to visit the sights outside of the peak visiting hours. Why spend an hour queueing to get into St Mark’s Basilica in the morning (as we watched many people do) when you can walk in after waiting for only five minutes just after 4pm? There are long queues to go up the Campanile tower in the morning too. Try visiting at the end of the day instead.
Get lost in the backstreets
Wandering around any new city is a lot more fun if you don’t let yourself become a slave to the guidebook and in Venice it’s an absolute joy to get lost. To discover Venice with kids properly you should be prepared to lose yourselves in the backstreets, to wander along tiny canals and over little bridges. Be sure to wander around the pretty neighbourhoods of Cannaregio and Castello. This is the Venice of fairy tales, of a city that hasn’t changed in hundreds of years and it’s worlds away from the tourist crowds of St Mark’s Square.
Let your children be your guide
Give older children the map and let them direct you to where you want to go. They’ll love the responsibility and the feeling of being in charge. Venice is a small enough city so that if you get lost it will be easy enough to find your bearings again.
Hunt for lions and dragons
The winged lion is the symbol of Venice and children can have fun searching for them all over the city. The easiest to spot are the winged lions on top of the columns in St Mark’s Square and the red marble lions just around the corner at the Piazzetta dei Leoncini. There are lions carved into the walls lining little canals and statues of lions in the centre of many squares. You’ll find dragons too if you know where to look. There’s a 14th-century statue of a dragon at Campo Santa Margherita in Dorsoduro and a wonderful mosaic of the Archangel Michael spearing a green dragon through the mouth with his sword in St Mark’s Basilica – you can get a really good view of this up close if you go up to the first floor of the church.
See the horses on the terrace of St Mark’s Basilica
My kids were very impressed with the amount of gold on the ceiling of St Mark’s Basilica. It’s well worth paying extra to go onto the terrace. The gold mosaics all over the walls and ceiling of the cathedral are much more impressive when you can see them up close and you’ll also be able to see that wonderful mosaic of St Michael killing the dragon. On the terrace you’ll get great views over St Mark’s Square as well as of the massive Roman bronze horses. The ones on the terrace are replicas but you can see the originals in a room just inside.
The Basilica of St Mark’s is open every day and is free to enter. Tickets for St Mark’s Museum cost €5 and provide access to the terrace.
Have fun on the water
Venice Kayak offers kayaking tours down the canals and in the Venetian lagoon and children from aged eight upwards can go in a double kayak with one of their parents. A half-day tour costs from €95 per person, one third less for children.
Explore all the bridges
You can’t visit Venice with kids without going over an awful lot of bridges. Our kids got a real thrill out of running over every bridge they found – and there are hundreds of bridges to discover in Venice. The big bridges like the Rialto Bridge and the Ponte dell’Accademia over the Grand Canal are great for the classic shots of Venice and it’s exciting to see the famous Bridge of Sighs in real life – the bridge between the Doge’s Palace and the infamous prisons where the prisoners would take their last glimpse of Venice and sigh before they were led to their cells.
It’s fun to look for the more unusual bridges too. Ours loved searching the tiny lanes and canals of the Cannaregio district for the Bridge with No Sides (Ponte de Chiodo).
Try on a carnival mask
You’ll discover beautiful theatrical masks in tiny shops down some of Venice’s backstreets. In some, you’ll even be able to watch artists making and painting the masks in a room at the back of the shop. We found a shop where the masks looked as if they belonged in the 18th century – and they definitely weren’t for touching. But a couple of doors down, at Ca’Macana, Sestiere Dorsoduro, you can try on lots of different masks and admire yourself in one of the mirrors. The shop also offers mask painting workshops for children.
Have breakfast the Italian way
Save money and time in the morning by doing as the Italians do and ordering your drink and pastry and eating them at the counter. It costs quite a bit less if you eat at the counter rather than sit at a table. This can be a bit tricky with children in busy bars but lots of caffès have extra counters running alongside the windows. You’ll still have to stand but there’s a lot more space. Good breakfast pastries to look out for are the croissants filled with chocolate or apricot jam (marmellata).
Go on a secret tour of the Doge’s Palace
We went on the Secret Itineraries Tour of the Doge’s Palace. It’s a guided tour which takes you into the parts of the palace used by the Venetian secret service so you get to see the torture chambers and the prisons. You walk down narrow passageways and through hidden doorways and find out about Casanova’s daring escape from the prison.
To find out more about the tour, take a look at Secret Tour of the Doge’s Palace in Venice.
Visit one of the world’s craziest bookshops
Can you even imagine a bookshop where the books are piled up in gondolas, old bathtubs and on the stairs? The wacky bookshop at Libreria Acqua Alta on Calle Santa Maria Formosa is a fabulously fun place to visit in Venice with kids. They’ll enjoy climbing the stair of books at the back of the shop for the canalside views. It’s no wonder it’s one of the Ten Best Bookshops in the World – it’s decorated with mannequins, gondola poles and oars, and the owner’s cats who wander in and out of the rambling rooms.
Explore the Campos
Venice’s squares are known as campos and are the perfect place for children to run around and let off steam. Some are large enough for kids to kick a football and lots have open-air cafés selling ice cream and pizza. You’ll find charming little campos in the neighbourhoods of Castello and Cannaregio.
The large square at Campo Santa Margherita in Dorsoduro is particularly good for kids to run around in and our favourite was the pretty square at Campo San Giacomo dell’Orio in Santa Croce. There’s a brilliant bar there called Al Prosecco where the grown ups can indulge in great Italian wine or prosecco (of course) while the kids have a play. The drinks for kids are great here too. Organic apple juices came in proper wine glasses with ice and lemon which our two thought was the ultimate indulgence.
Take a gondola ride
Yes, it’s expensive (at about €80 for 30 minutes) and touristy but riding in a gondola is one of the quintessential Venetian experiences. Gliding slowly down the narrow canals while you sit in a throne and get your picture taken by countless tourists is not just fun but soothing. You’ll surrender to the gentle rhythm of the oars dipping in and out of the water and get incomparable views of the canals, bridges and palazzos. Look for a gondola that will take you both on the Grand Canal and down the tiny canals in the quieter neighbourhoods.
But there are cheaper ways of riding in a gondola too. Traghettos cross the Grand Canal at various points and you can ride in one of these from one side to the other for only a couple of euros.
Visit Burano, one of the most colourful places in the world
Take a look at The Colourful Island of Burano for a photo tour and more inspiration to visit.
Explore a palazzo
Our kids were desperate to go inside some of the palaces (palazzos) they could see alongside the canals. The smaller palazzos are often easier with children. We loved the Palazzo Mocenigo near Rialto. This 17th-century palace looks fit for a masked ball with its grand rooms filled with historic furniture and chandeliers. But it’s the collection of historic fashion that’s the real draw here. You can see exquisite dresses and elaborately embroidered waistcoats from the 17th century. There’s also a fascinating exhibition about perfume where you can find out how Venice became the world’s most important importer of perfume and get to smell all the exotic scents that made their way into the city.
Palazzo Mocenigo is open every day except Monday. Adults, €8; children, €5.50; under 6s, free.
Try Venetian food
Venice’s version of tapas is called cicchetti and these small snacks are an ideal way for children to try lots of delicious Venetian food. You’ll find cod purée, tiny prawns, cheeses, hams and vegetables in tiny sandwiches or on top of a small slice of bread. Lots of restaurants serve plates of cicchetti as a starter but it’s even more fun to go to an osteria or a bàcari, one of the traditional Venetian bars, and order a plate of cicchetti for everyone to try. We loved All’Arco on the Calle dell’Ochialer just around the corner from the Rialto market. Most locals stand up to eat and drink but there are a couple of tables outside which are more suitable for families.
Climb the towers for the best views
We always try to climb up a tower to get great views over a city and in Venice you’ll find amazing views from the top of the 99-metre tall Campanile, the bell tower on St Mark’s Square. The other advantage of this tower for children is that you get to the top by a lift and don’t have to climb loads of stairs. This is where Galileo Galilei tested his telescope in 1609 and there are 360 degree views from the top. Avoid the long queues to go up the Campanile in the morning and arrive just before dusk. At this time there’s only a short wait and you’ll be rewarded with a magical view over the city’s spires and rooftops as the light fades.
The bell tower is open every day. Tickets, €8.
Indulge in the city’s best hot chocolate
The best treat after a day of sightseeing is a pot of thick hot chocolate. We always enjoy searching out a city’s best hot chocolate and the ultimate treat in Venice with kids is the one at Caffè Florian on St Mark’s Square. Florian’s is a Venice institution. It’s the oldest café in the world and it looks like a jewel box inside with its plush red seats, marble tables and gold leaf everywhere. The waiters wear white jackets and you’ll be serenaded by the orchestra playing outside.
Try every flavour of gelato
Watch the glass blowers
You can see artists blowing glass to make colourful rings, vases and other ornaments in lots of the glass shops in Venice but if you want to see the big glass furnaces you’ll need to go to the workshops on the island of Murano where you can watch glass blowers creating all kinds of wonderful creations. My children particularly liked the tiny glass animals and both came home with a horse as their Venice souvenir.
It takes about 40 minutes to get to Murano by boat from Venice. You can get there on the number 12, 4.1 or 4.2 water buses.
Visit a gondola workshop
Go on an art workshop at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection
Venice is filled with art. There are enough Titians and Tintorettos to take your breath away. But it’s not always easy persuading your children to spend hours hunting out the Venetian masterpieces. The best art museum for families is the Peggy Guggenheim Collection on the Grand Canal in Dorsoduro. This is a wonderful collection of modern art from Picasso and Salvador Dali to Jackson Pollock and Kandinsky. Every Sunday afternoon there are free art workshops for children aged from four to 12 years old. The museum is open from 10am until 6pm every day except Tuesday. Adults, €15; children from 10 to 18, €9; under 10s, free.
What are your favourite things to do in Venice with kids? Take this article with you as an app. You can download this blog post as a GPS-guided travel article with GPSmyCity. To find out more about how GPS-guided travel articles work on an app, read this guide.
For more ideas and inspiration of cities to visit with children, take a look at The Best City Breaks for Families in Europe – Part One and Part Two. You’ll also find individual guide to cities under the City Guides section of the menu above.
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