ctu

Hi! I'm going to Venice in May and want to make reservations for the Doge's Palace Secret Itineraries tour. I also want to see St Mark's Basilica on the same day. My question is: Does anyone know how long each of those take? The basilica doesn't open until 10 am. I am concerned about lines and a crowd, so was hoping to go when it opens. And book the Doge's tour for 11:30. What will only leave me 1 hour and 15 mins for the Basilica. Will that be enough time? Does the Basilica take reservations so I don't have to stand in line? Any information would be appreciated! Thanks

missypie

I've lost the email address, but yes, St. Mark's does take reservations. They're free and you just go to the front of the line and show them your email. Visits to St. Mark's are supposed to be limited to 10 minutes, so yes, an hour and 15 minutes will be long enough. We were there probably 30 minutes and no one asked us to leave. We went upstairs to the museum.

scrb

Any links to the web site with info about these tours?

Or email addresses?

TIA.

sylviam

We made reservations for St. Mark's also, however, when we got there the attendants at the front ignored our "papers" and we had to go to the end of the line. Fortunately for us it was short. You can do both in the same day but depending upon the line at St. Mark's I would say you are cutting it very close. The tickets for The Doge's Palace Secret Itineraries Tour are timed tickets.

Remember that you cannot bring any backpacks into the Basicilla, they have to be checked around the corner

missypie

Sylviam, that is what I was afraid would happen to me! I felt silly showing my email to the guy; I totally expected him to laugh at me and send me to the end of the line, but it worked for me.

ctu

Thanks for the info everyone!

Can anyone tell me how long they spend in the Basilica? Was there a lot to see?

franco

For me, everything less than two hours is clearly not enough for the basilica of S. Marco - but then, I never go in at any time that has any tourists. I only go in months like November or December... and I don't know whether they would allow to stay inside that long in high season. I can't quite believe, though, that anybody is really planning on limiting visits to 10 minutes; if so, they could close S. Marco for good, since you wouldn't see anything at all in 10 minutes.
What you could do, though, is going to the Doge's Palace earlier; what most people don't seem to know is that the Itinerari Segreti tour guides you ONLY through those parts of the palace that are NOT open to individual visitors; with the tour, you have seen a quite interesting part of the palace, but a minor part, and NOT the famous & pompous ceremonial halls. For those alone, you'd need at least three hours... so what I'd suggest is go to the Palace as early as you can, start the visit to the ceremonial rooms (with your Itinerari Segreti ticket, you can go in and out whenever you want), then do the tour, then go back to the ceremonial rooms to visit the rest of the palace, and then go to the basilica and stay as long as they wouldn't throw you out.

ira

ttt

sylviam

Website for San Marco www.basilicasanmarco.it