My husband and I will be traveling to Venice in June after he has a business meeting. We will be leaving Bormio (somewhat near Lake Como) on Saturday and flying out of Milan on Tuesday. We plan to visit Venice Saturday and Sunday and return to Milan on Monday. My question is this: would you recommend that we return our car in Milan and then take the train to Venice or would you park at one of the garages? I sort of hate to pay for the car and parking if it is not necessary, but I don't know if it is just worth the expense for convenience. As this is a business trip most of our expenses are covered with the exception of the weekend, so I really can't complain. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Also, do you all recommend a side trip to Verona, or is that just trying to do too much?

If you're already going to have a car and if you can return it to Piazza Roma in Venice, then I'd drive. Take a train back to Milan and the shuttle to the airport when you depart.
Verona is wonderful, but if you've not been to Venice before, I wouldn't steal the valuable and limited time you have there for Verona -- this trip.

Judging by my recent experience in driving out of Venice from the Hert rental office in Piazzale Roma, driving into the city should be easy, esp. on the weekend.

Nothing quite equals arriving by train -- or boat -- but Piazzale Roma is so easy! and when we rented in Venice and dropped off in Rome in late March, there was no drop-off charge with Hertz (rented through Autoeurope)

There is a vaporetto stop opposite P.le Roma....Where in Venice are you headed?

My experience (quite some years ago) driving into Venice on a Friday afternoon was that traffic gets VERY bottlenecked up. But maybe Saturday morning is okay.

If you do drive, I would think it will be worth your while to get up and get going early.

Remember, Venice is an easy and pleasant weekend getaway for well over 50 million people. It's old hat to some of them - - but not nearly the majority.

Best wishes,

Rex

We are going to be staying at the Hotel Gritti courtesy Starwood points (my husbands wicked travel schedule does have some rewards). I really don't know what our plans are for the city yet as we just decided today that we would go to Venice. I will be studying up on Venice and trying to learn some Italian. Any suggestions on what to tour and what to avoid would also be awesome. Thank you so much.