the b&b looks great. Thanks for the recommendation - I think we're going to book it.

vbro.com/21935 vbro.com/25432 or vbro.com/197842
Hi; B&B looks great. Here are a few other thoughts if you intend to stay three or four nights. When in June will you be there? A/C could be needed.

Obviously, you've already made up your mind and are going to stay in Venice proper, but let me add, nonetheless, that staying on the Lido is a big no-no!! On the Lido, there is car traffic, which deprives you of one of the most enchanting features of a trip to Venice: to see no car for all the time you're there!
Btw, I strongly advise against staying at that B&B, lovely as it may be (I don't know it). S. Elena is certainly the least recommended part of Venice center in all respects - as far as practicalities (considerable distances to all sights, not just the main sights!) and above all, as far as beauty. S. Elena is the only part of Venice that is really nothing special, just like the pedestrianized part of any other charmless small town.

Franco’s comments might seem a little “harsh” with regard to St Helena and the Lido, but he is totally correct.

Avoid the Lido – the money that is saved by having cheaper accommodation is offset by the lack of convenience and the car traffic. The ferry cost from the Lido to San Marco is six Euro, so the ferry costs can quickly add up.

St Helena is a long way from the centre of Venice, and is at least a 20 minute walk, maybe more. It is short of places to eat, friendly bars, and not too many things to see are to be found there, unless you are attracted to washing lines strung across the streets. We’ve walked around that part of Venice a couple of times, and found it very quiet. The gardens are nice, but nowhere near as fine as the gardens that you will have seen in Vienna, and they are overlooked by three story apartment buildings dating from about 1950.

One of the things in Venice worth seeing is the Rialto fish market, and you’d want to be there really early in the morning, at say 6:00 AM – that’s hard from the far end of Castello.

Don’t be too committed to the “Breakfast” part of B&B – you can find breakfast, Venetian style, at any bar. Have a coffee and croissant standing at the bar, and it will cost you about three Euro a head. If you sit down it will cost more, and if you take breakfast at an outside table, it will cost more again.

Think about Dorsoduro or San Polo for places to stay, and these areas are generally cheaper than San Marco or the west of Castello. The area around the Piazzale Roma, while convenient to the station, is less than charming.

No matter where you stay, you’ll want to go back!

Apologies - it's St Elena, not St Helena in Venice.

Bratsandbeer... don't get ticked off but ... "It is in an Italian neighborhood"???

I would have thought it might be if it was in Italy!

Just LOL... no harm meant! And, yes, I do understand that there are other ethnic neighborhoods in various countries/cities. Just found the comment funny.

joannyc Ha! Ha! It was an Italian neighborhood - I should have said away from the usual touristy areas. The school children had a soccer game in the park one morning. It was fun to watch the families in the evening.

Our first trip to Venice we stayed along the Grand Canal and it was all kiosks selling souvenirs etc. So being in this neighborhood was very different.

I read Peter's view of St Elena. The restaurants had very good food and we felt less like tourists and more like family.

We enjoyed St Elena and the location even though others seem to not like it. But everyone looks for different things when they travel.

hi brat,

we didn't stay in that area, but walked through it on the way back from a trip to the islands, when we got off the boat at the giardino stop. what we saw we liked too - the shops were proper shops aimed at locals, there were "real" people going about their business, and there were fewer tourists [like us, lol!].

it's an area where having a boat pass would be a definite advantage, as you would be a little distance from the main sights.

Thanks for all your help. We just bought our tickets. What we do between arrival and departure is not set in stone but it looks like we'll be spending 3 days in Budapest, 2 in Vienna (I know it's not much but it's better than nothing at all, and 4 days in Venice (we were able to add another day to Venice when we found an additional day of babysitting). If anyone has suggestions that fit withing this tentative itinerary let me know.

hi bg,

well, you already know that the time in Vienna is short, but long enough to get a flavour of the place. in June you will have long days, so you could spend one day in Vienna itself, seeing the Hofburg and any of the many museums that take your fancy, finishing with a trip to the Prater.

then on the 2nd day, I'd suggest starting off with the Schoenbrunn Palace, then going onto somewhere like Grinzing and spending the late afternoon/evening in a Heuriger [wine tavern] eating and drinking the local wine.

...yes, but not in Grinzing, Ann! Grinzing is the typical tourist rip-off Heurigen zone; nobody of the locals is going there.

ok, Franco - I was thinking of somewhere easy to get to for an afternoon.

where would you suggest?

Well, Grinzing is not that easy to get to, either, is it? I would think of Sievering, or Neustift am Walde, which are both not that far away from Grinzing; or of Heiligenstadt, which is the choice of the posh Viennese.

I agree with the others, visit the Lido area, don't stay there. Venice is a place to just get lost (and you will!). That's the fun of it, aside from its beauty!

Now for Vienna, I've been there twice, and as much as I like visiting sights and museums, sitting in cafes and drinking, I am a total sucker for amusement parks, and Vienna has one of the BEST! The Prater, with the giant ferris wheel that is shown in The Third Man.

Well, Grinzing is not that easy to get to, either, is it? I would think of Sievering, or Neustift am Walde, which are both not that far away from Grinzing; or of Heiligenstadt, which is the choice of the posh Viennese.>>

lol, franco, we managed it easily enough. we got a bus [or was it a tram?] then a bus to the top of the Kahlenberg, then walked down into Grinzing, where, I must say, we found only a few Heuriger which were very untouristy - we were surrounded by Viennese accents. if we hadn't read about the fir branch sticking out over the door trick, we'd never have found them at all.

the place we found with the highest concentration of Heuriger was Gumpoldskirchen - [near Baden, south of Vienna for those who aren't as familiar with the area as Franco] - i got to over a dozen before I stopped counting. and there were at least two normal bars as well. it was a wine-lover's paradise but it hasn't featured in any list of Heuriger villages that I've seen. even though we were there at the time of their wine-festival, we heard only German being spoken, which was nice for us, but probably not so good for their pockets.

Honestly, this description doesn't sound as if you've managed it at all! In Grinzing, even many years ago, there were no fir branches anymore, and the Heurigen there were open all-year-round, with fake "traditional" live music and the like. The fir branches serve to indicate the temporary opening of a Heurigen, which is the traditional way to run these taverns - the real Heurigen open for just a few weeks a year. So as soon as they become "normal" taverns that are always open, there's no longer any need for the branches. And so, the fir branches indicate that you've been I-don't-know-where, but not in Grinzing. (And nobody would face any difficulty at all to identify a Grinzing Heurigen. They're shouting at you, so to speak, so the only way to go wrong is to go inside.)

so where the heck did we go????

it was near Beethoven's summer house, which i thought, obviously erroneously, was in Grinzing. we certainly enjoyed ourselves - so much so, that we can't actually agree on how many Heuriger we visited!! perhaps they were just figments of our fevered imaginations.

Whether to split or not to split comes down to travel styles, IMHO. For those who prefer a casual, relaxed, and laid back sightseeing pace, then yes, spending all your time in one area probably makes the most sense. But if your style is more active such that you don't mind getting up before 9am and filling the day with fun things to see and do, then there's plenty of time to see both great cities.

It sounds like you're inclined to split the time. I think that's particularly wise if there's a decent chance you may not be returning any time soon. I could see a 3/3 split. I love Venice because she's so unique, magical and romantic. But her essence can easily be captured in 2 full days, esp if you stay there. So 3 days would be a little icing on the cake.

Vienna is very nice, too. Here again, I think you could cover the "A" list of things to see and do in 3 days. It just has a totally different feel than Venice.

Have a great trip!

Ah, Ann, that's easy! Near Beethoven's summer house, so you've been in Heiligenstadt. What I recommended above!

well, thank you Franco - mystery solved. great minds think alike - even if one of them doesn't know it!

bg - if you're still "listening" whilst franco and I have this rather tedious conversation, I've remembered that if you DO want to visit both the Hofburg AND the Schoenbrunn palaces, the "Sissi" ticket that you can buy at the Hofburg [with minimal queues when we were there last June] will get you straight into the Schoenbrunn palace, where they were huge queues for timed tickets, with no queuing and no waiting about. AND it covers all the rooms - so is equivalent to the most expensive ticket available if you buy it separately. I think that it saved us about €5 each, AND if either/both of you are 60 or over, that person gets a further seniors' discount. [this is common all over Vienna].

what was not worthwhile i our opinion was the Vienna pass - especially if you have a senior discount available, as you can only have one or the other. OTOH, the transport pass WAS worthwhile - the network of trams, buses and underground is fantastic and it's great just to be able to hop on and off without worrying about tickets.