venice-travel by train,planes,boats?
 

We will be arriving to Venice by train. How do we get from the train to Venice? And, how long will it take? Cost?
We will be leaving Venice by plane. How will we get to airport? How long will it take? Cost?
Thanks for your help!

When you arrive by train, do not get off at Mestre. Be sure to stay on the train until you get actually get to Venice. Once you arrive, you can take the vaporetto to your hotel stop. The vaporetto is located just outside the train station and you can buy a ticket there. Be sure to ask your hotel which stop is closest and also be sure you are on the boat going the correct direction down the Grand Canal. This is relatively inexpensive. I don't recall the exact cost, but it's under 10 euro for an hour pass on the vaporetto...if I'm not mistaken. The time of the trip will depend on how far down the Grand Canal your hotel is. I would say 20 minutes max.

You will need to either take the Aligaluna (sp?) or private water taxi to the airport on your departure. I have no idea what the former costs since we did the water taxi due to our early flight. The water taxi was about 90 euro from near the Rialto Bridge to the airport. You can book a water taxi near the Rialto bridge, but be sure to make arrangements a day prior.

I hope this helps, but you will undoubtedly get a lot more wonderful information on this board in answer to your questions.

Statia- Thanks for your help. How long did it take to get to the airport via water taxi? We have a very early flight as well.

Hi srhughes, I just returned from Italy a week ago and we arrived via train and left via Marco Polo airport. The cost of the vaporetto was 5EU per person and was valid for 90 minutes. It is a fixed price no matter what stop you get off at. I agree with the previous response you received to this message.....ask your hotel which water taxi stop is closest. The rest of your trip will probably be spent on foot since the water taxi (vaparetto) is so expensive at 5EU per person per trip although it makes for a good tourist activity to ride it up and down the grand canal one day for the entire 90 minutes just to get a feel for the entire place. When you go to the airport, you need to take a boat called Aligaluna (sp?) and it leaves about 3x hour from the Piazza San Marco stop on the Grand Canal. I believe it leaves at the 20, 30 and 50 past the hour but you have to check. You can buy tickets right there and you do not need to make a reservation. The cost is 10EU per person and it takes 1 hour and 10 minutes so plan ahead. You may want to stop by the ticket booth the day before you leave just so you can scope out where to go and what the schedule is. Hope this is helpful. Let me know if you have additional questions.

The vaparetto does not have to be that expensive. Several passes are available. Two years ago, a 3 day unlimited ride pass was about 18E. I think 5 day passes are also available. We preferred using the pass so that we didn't have to worry about buying tickets every time. Looking back, we could have walked most places faster than waiting for the boat, but we didn't know better!

The website for the vaparettos (local water bus) is www.actv.it This concept of 5-10 e for a certain period of time is news to me. When I was there a year ago, it was either a single ticket for about 3e or a multi day unlimited pass for about 18e. I recommend you consider the pass. What vaparetto stop is your hotel near? It should say n their website.

The alilaguna website for transport to the airport is alilaguna.com The alilaguna (10e/person) actually starts running very early. The problem arises if your hotel is not near one of the alilaguna stops (San Marco & Zattere are the 2 main ones) because the vaparetto (to get to the alilaguna) doesn't start running as early. In that case,a water taxi the whole way is probably best. Your hotel can arrange it. The other benefit of the taxi is if your hotel has a water dock, the taxi will pick you up at your hotel so you don't have to drag luggage. (True also if you take a taxi when you arrive by train. That trip might be 50e).

Water taxi will take 20-45 mins to the airport, while alilaguna takes an hr 10 mins because it makes stops along the way.

There is also a very inexpensive land bus I forgot to mention, that runs between the trains station & the airport, if your hotel happens to be near the train station. I think the schedule for this may be on one of the websites I gave you. Otherwise, check the Marco Polo airport website which has transport info.

srhughes: As mclaurie said, allow yourself 20-45 minutes to the airport by water taxi, depending on the time of day. It took us roughly 30 minutes at 7 a.m.

One thing to keep in mind:

A water taxi is a private boat for hire (a taxi) the vaporetto is a large boat that follows a defined route (a water bus) the Aliliguna is a boat that is a shuttle service, operating on a fxed route with fewer stops than a vaporetto.

See http://www.alilaguna.it/