We will be traveling to italy late july. will be in venice for 2 days. Would love suggestions on what to do and see and also need a hotel for 2 adults and 2 children. Any comments or suggestions greatly appreciated.

We stayed in a quad at the Hotel FLora (3*), 4 years ago. This is a delightfully charming hotel, in a quiet location very near San Marco. Back then it ran about $300ish.

I stayed in Pensione La Cucina last time. Good location, nice hotel, good breakfast. Amazing gelatto place down the street. Easy to get to by vaparetto.

I think poster above may mean Pensione La Calcina(?)

I don't know about family rooms, but it is a lovely place to stay.

www.lacalcina.com

I read about the Hotel Ala in this forum. We were there in March of 2004. We'd transferred from another hotel closer to St. Marc’s and it was a definite upgrade. Wonderful central location on one of the side canals, beautifully furnished, much better than average breakfast. Hearing the gondoliers playing the guitar and singing outside our window was a very pleasant experience. We enjoyed the splurge of having a taxi boat picking us up and returning to the airport.

http://www.hotelala.it/

Good morning, second, the hotel ALA stayed there two or three times many years ago and was completely satisified wilth it. Also the DoPozzi
La Fenice and Saturnia all excellant..
Richard of LaGrange Park, Il.

Hi-
If you don't care about stayingin Venice itself, I would suggest the Hotel Villa Stella on Lido Island. My wife and I will be there in august this year. I made our decision based upon reviews from vacationers who stayed there and everyone one of them said it was excellent! If you want to see the Hotel go to their web sitewhich I believe is villa stella.com oOur three day superio Double rate is a total of 270 Euros. also, you might want to check out venere.com. They have many reviews for each hotel that you might want to stay in for any city in Italy. Hope this helps.

To each his own, but I'd never go to Venice and stay on Lido -- unless I wanted to lounge on a beach all day.
Too far. I like popping in and out throughout the day, not packing up and going to another island for the day. Sort of like going to New York, but staying in New Jersey. Too much time and effort traveling back and forth.

What to see? Mainly get vaporetto passes and travel around alot, getting off when and where you want to. St. Mark's, the Basilica, the Tower, and the Doge's Palace, of course. I'd go to the Accademia if you want to do a museum. See the fish market in the morning, and observe deliveries made all over town by boat. Maybe go to Murano (on your pass) and see glass blowers at work, if that appeals to you. And by all means spend a late night in St. Mark's sitting and sipping way overpriced drinks or having dessert and listening to the "battle of the orchestras".

We stayed at Hotel Flora and were very pleased.