My husband and i are taking a cruise out of Venice. We will be staying there for two days before we depart. We would like to stay close to the down town area of Venice. We would like to be able to walk to San Marcos Square. Our budget in $200 or less. However we could go a bit more if it is worth the stay. Can anyone please give us some suggestions on hotels. When we log on to hotels.com they all sort of look the same. Help is appreciated. Thanks

If you do a search here for Venice hotels that should get you started...

I love the idea of "down town", as in underwater.

Just to help, the place has two types of transport, walking and boat. Everywhere is within 30 minutes walk of San Marcos, but it is very easy to get lost (so making it a great deal more than 30 minutes). San Marcos is a very expensive centre so you need to find a hotel a bit back to get the price way down. I'd surf here a bit more

what's your budget?

will you have a lot of luggage?

do you want a canal view?

oops, missed the $200 bit. scrub the canal view.

Try the Star Splendid
http://splendidvenice.starhotels.com/en/home.aspx
3 min walk San Marco 3 min the other way to Rialto Stop
Close to just about everything, great service. Ask for Canal view room

sadly i think that the Star Splendid is outside the OP's budget.

You could try Hotel Galleria http://www.hotelgalleria.it/default.asp

For a simple one-star hotel, we liked the Hotel Riva in Venice, close to St Mark's (but not too close that it felt crowded). I think it is in your budget.

Hotel Riva is on the confluence of two small canals, and our corner room on the first floor had views of both canals. I think we had room #1, which had a double bed and a twin bed in a small alcove. The bathroom was tiny, but not a big problem. (First floor is good because there is no elevator.)

A very simple breakfast is offered in a dining room which directly overlooks the little canal.

http://www.hotelriva.it/ENG/description.html

We have stayed at Pensione La Calcina twice and enjoyed both our visits. It's about a 15-20 minute walk to San Marco.

Hotel Corte Grimani would be perfect. It does require a 2 night stay. We stayed years ago and it's only 2 minutes to San Marco.

Thanks everyone. I have been looking for several hours and I just posted our first two choices and wanted to know what everyone thought. Hotel Rialto or Carlton on the Grand Canal.

hi hellokitty - do you mean that you have posted the links?

cos they aren't here!

hellokittygeorgia,

Check B&B Al Teatro.

http://www.bedandbreakfastalteatro.com/en/

We stayed here this past May. A very small (only 3 rooms) B&B, just a short (approx 7 minutes) straight shot (or as straight is it gets in Venice) walk to Piazza San Marco.

The proprietor, Eleanora, is a gem. Just a fantastic hostess. Cannot speak highly enough of our experience here.

One of the rooms, the Amber Room, which we stayed in is the largest (and it is very large, especially by European standards AND has a small balcony overlooking a heavily trafficked (read gondolas) canal just below. That particular room may be out of your stated budget range, but not by much and location and hospitality would be VERY MUCH worth it. The other two rooms cost less and from speaking to other guests during our stay, are very comfortable as well.

Quite a number of photos available on Trip Advisor, including a few of my own.

Highly highly highly recommend!!!

forgot to mention what many people find to be a very important "perk" for a hotel in Venice...

After exiting the vaporetto at the appropriate stop, there are NO bridges to cross to get to Al Teatro. It is a very short walk from the vaporetto stop to the B&B

Honestly, for a 2-night stay in Venice, <b>it is not worth one second of thought</b> thinking about a moderate financial "upgrade" to any hotel room in the $200-a-night range for any hotel near or within brief walking distance to Piazza San Marco.

The bottom line in Venice is: If you aren't requesting a specific room by number (which is what repeat visitors do, and Venice has them by the millions), you're going to get what is available at the time of your booking. If you're not willing to stay in one of the bigger "institutional" properties, the available choices in boutique properties will be slim to none, depending on the time of year.

Spending $20-$50 more a night will mostly likely yield no benefit. You'll just be paying more money for a very small room with a tiny bathroom, no matter which hotel you select.

NYCFoodSnob, you may want to insert at least one, if not a couple, "IMO/IMHO" into your post, because I'm sure there would be a decent number of people, myself included, who would whole-heartedly disagree with you.

Unless you have been to Venice many, many times and scouted out a vast number of hotels, your statement is not fair at all. If you have, and you spent your entire time in Venice, recon-ing hotels, there are also a whole lot of people who would say you completely wasted your time in Venice.

That's why the OP posted the question, was to find out what people's experiences have been. I, for one, can fully attest that the B&B I spoke of is 100% worth a stretch in budget, if possible. I have sent three friends and/or friends of friends to it since my stay, and all have absolutely loved it.

OP gave a budget of USD200 ( €150 ). Is that per night ( I hope) ?

This would be useuful if OP mentioned the dates of stay as well because the rates change a LOT depending the the seasons and on specific days ( holidays, etc). And high seasons can be 200/300% more expensive than lowest time. For expample, last December we stayed at a 3* B&B like hotel Ca' Zose in nice Dorsoduro area between Salute Church and Guggenheim Museum. Modest hotel but still nice enough for us and not a tiny room - 16m2, with bathroom - lots of hot water. We checked out the hotel as satisfied customers. We paid the lowest seasos rate of €55.00 per night incl. breakfast. If I look at their rate for the room of the same category in May, that costs €170.00.

We don't see many IMHO on Fodors because virtually all of it is IMHO