blade2007

My husband and I are going to Rome, Venice and Florence 8/26-9/13. We are having problems booking hotel/B&B for Venice 9/2 to 9/6, due to the Cinema Festival. Please help, our price range is around US $150+-. Hope to stay right in the city, this is our first trip to Italy.

Our plans are arriving Rome 8/27 - 9/2, 9/2-9/7 Venice, 9/8 - 9/13 departing from Florence. Should we book the train tickets before we leave US or buy them online, we like to leave the days open in case we want to stay more or less here and there. Are the train tickets for open days?

I'm reading all the great tips and thank you all in advance with your help.

MaureenB

In Venice, try Hotel Riva and Casa Rezzonico (sp?). They are both simple, but nice and clean, hotels. Riva sits at the confluence of two canals, so you can get great canal views. Rezzonico is in the Dorsoduro area, a bit quieter and more 'homey' feeling. Our family members have stayed in each of them and recommend them. Both are in your price range, I think. Good luck.
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blade2007

Thank you for your quick reply. Do you have the contact info to these 2 hotels?

ira

Hi B,

Als try bernardo semenzati and al campaniel.

You can google all of the suggested hotels.

MaureenB

I wanted to check my spelling:
http://www.casarezzonico.it/

And
www.hotelriva.it

There are lots of hotels recommended on this forum. Do a search for Venice hotels here and you fill find lots of others, but the favorites might be booked given the Festival and the close time-frame. Good luck.
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blade2007

hi ira,

I tried to google benardo semenzati, but didn't find a match. I did manage to eamil al campaniel. Thank you much.

b

blade2007

Hi MB,

Thank you again. I have emailed both hotes for detail information.

Blade

ellenem

<<Should we book the train tickets before we leave US or buy them online, we like to leave the days open in case we want to stay more or less here and there. Are the train tickets for open days?>>

The fastest trains for these routes are the ES trains which include seat reservations with every ticket. If you book an ES train, you have a seat reserved for that particular train. The next level of service down, IC, includes reserved seats on some trains (IC Plus?), but always has the option of reserved seats at an additional fee.

For these popular routes and length of travel, I would prefer to have a reserved seat. I have no desire to search a packed train for an empty seat or get stuck stanidng in a corridor for a few hours. Since ES is all reserved, this would not be an issue. On an IC with optional reservations, it may be difficult to find an empty seat, since the train doesn't require reservations so many will just hop on the next train as you hope to do.

You could book the tickets online before you leave if you like, but it's probably not necessary.

You could also book all tickets once you arrive in Rome at the first ticket venue you reach to be sure you can travel at the times you want. Some travel agencies also sell train tickets, so there is no need to go all the away to the station to buy tickets.

Finally, you could try buying the tickets just before departure and take a chance that seats would be available. You'd have a better chance of finding a seat on short notice in first class. If you wait until the day and time you are leaving and your train is fully booked, you might have to wait an hour or two for the next available train.

For ES, second class is good enough for me. For IC, I always purchase 1st class.

toni_g_b

Try venere.com to see availability for your dates in Venice. I just did a quick search and there were several listed within your price range. Most were a little off from Piazza San Marco, but there were some in the Castello area and I can tell you from our experience it's a fairly short walk to the sites.

To the best thing about the venere site is the reviews of the hotel from previous guests. We've done most of our hotel searches on this site and we have yet to be disappointed - except the hotel in Milan and we should have paid more attention to reviews that said the staff were rude! And that's putting it mildly! But I digress.

Julie_Hurst

blade, you might want to expedite your search & email a lot of hotels all at the same time. You are not committed at this point & you will probably get a lot of "no vacancy".

Here's what I do: bring up tripadvisor.com, select the review tab, & leave this on my screen.

Then bring up venere.com & after entering my city & dates, scroll down & select my price range (I go a little above).

Go thru the list & when I reach one in the area & price I want, I flip back to tripadvisor & check out the reviews (venere has reviews too, but not as good IMO). If it looks good, I send them an email with dates, # of adults/children, & # of rooms want. Keep going down the list, etc.

Now, finding the hotel website is not an easy feat - & some I could not find. So, first I try www.(the hotel name).com & then the hotel name with .it. Sometimes I substitute albergo for hotel, residenza for residence. I found a lot that way. Also went to www.slowtrav.com, clicked on Italy in the green bar at the top; clicked on "hotels" in the green bar; scrolled down & selected Lazio-Rome; found hotel reviews with website addresses.

Another suggestion for you is that you could book via Venere.com, after checking reviews on tripadvisor.com & after checking out the location of the hotel. That is an easy way, but I like to book direct with the hotel.

Good luck, Julie

nytraveler

A couple of years ago we did a congress in Venice that started the day after the film festival. I had to get there early for prep. Even though we reserved 8 months in advance the only way I got the room was that we had reserved over 300 room/nights with the hotel. The price was more than double the usual rate on the festival night I was there (room was almost $800 THEN).

And I undestand that some people had to stay 30 minutes outside of Venice by train to find any place at a reasonable rate.

I would reserve something today outside of Venice as a desperation back-up while you look for something there. Other wise you may be completely shut out of anyplace decent.

chicagolori

I plugged in your dates to the site at Italyby.com. I have used them several times and they are reputable.

I searched for only hotels that had instant confirmation - and there are several pages of them.

Do read the cancellation policies on this site and sometimes that are more strict than usual.

You might also want to look at the hotels here that show availability and then try to book them directly thru the hotel website.

I agree with NY Traveler - this is pretty late to book Venice in September - even without the film festival. So - i would expedite.

Let us know what you end up doing. Good luck.

http://www.italyby.com/cgi/searchpowernew.cgi