How does the Secret Itinerary tour differ from regular tour? And how does one book it? Many thanks.

It has been a few years since I have been to Venice, so I cannot remember the details of how the tours are different. I believe you see more of the private meeting quarters, secret passage ways, Bridge of Sighs, etc. We e-mailed our inn (Locanda Orseolo) before departure, and they secured the tickets for us. I image most inns and hotels will do the same upon request.

The entirety of the Secret Itineraries tour is not covered in the regular tour. All private behind-the-scenes areas on the floors above the larger public rooms.

Hi N,

The Secret tour takes you into the "private" rooms of the palace.

It's a lot of walking in narrow stairways.

Phone number from US is 011 39 41 520 9070. English-speaking operator.

You will not be charged for your tickets if you don't go on the tour.

Online bookings are at http://tinyurl.com/z3jy2

Just took the tour in February. It's a lot more of the history of the Doges, their office rooms (very plain and sparse), the jail cells (including Casanova's), how he escaped and you'll also walk in the rafters and see how the large public room is supported. We enjoyed it and it was a highlight for my husband...but he also has an interest in history. I would not take this tour in the summer...the heat in the rooms would be too intense.

Have a wonderful trip.

We booked online direct with the doges palace website last year for this trip and were really pleased we had [if you do not get confirmation make sure you check your spam filter as their orignal reply got filtered out] You get a reference number to show the counter when you pick up the tickets. Very well worth it in August as queue for tickets was very long. This was a really good trip behind the scenes into the old admin offices, cells and over the ceilings of the huge paintings. We had an excellent guide who made the history come alive. In many ways we found it more intersting than the grand main part of the palace as the emphasis was more on the social history than on the paintings etc. Take a bottle of water as it is quite a long tour but it was not unbearably hot even in height of summer.

I dsiagree that this tour would be too hot in summer - we took this tour in August - very hot outside but delightfully cool in all the rooms. They had many windows open which allowed breezes. We loved this tour as did our kids (18 and 13) - wouldn't have gotten much out of the palace if we had gone on our own.