Product Description

Discover Venice & The Veneto

Relive Casino Royale and cruise the Grand Canal in your very own speedboat

Escape the menu turistico and dine instead on baccala and Bellinis in hidden backstreet bars

Take the art-pilgrim path to Padua, then sit with fireflies in Verona's pink-marble arena

Contemplate Venice's less salubrious past, when the Catalogue of Courtesans was the guidebook of choice

In This Guide:

One author, 12 years of Venice know-how, five extended walks, one attempt at the Vogalonga

The only guide that goes the extra mile in finding gorgeous, great value canalside accommodation

Meet the mayor, learn about the lagoon and appreciate the city's artistic heritage - locals spill the beans on Italy's most beautiful city

Content updated daily - visit lonelyplanet.com for up-to-the-minute reviews, updates and traveler highlights

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #273823 in Books
• Published on: 2008-02-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 308 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781741046571
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"Nobody covers the world like Lonely Planet."
-- New York Post, May 2004

Nobody covers the world like Lonely Planet.' --New York Post, May 2004

From the Publisher
Who We Are
At Lonely Planet, we see our job as inspiring and enabling travelers to connect with the world for their own benefit and for the benefit of the world at large.

What We Do
* We offer travelers the world's richest travel advice, informed by the collective wisdom of over 350 Lonely Planet authors living in 37 countries and fluent in 70 languages.
* We are relentless in finding the special, the unique and the different for travellers wherever they are.
*We update our guidebooks by visiting thousands of places in person to get the details right and tell it as it is.
* We always offer the trusted filter for those who are curious, open minded and independent.
* We challenge our growing community of travelers; leading debate and discussion about travel and the world.
* We tell it like it is without fear or favor in service of the travelers; not clouded by any other motive.

What We Believe
We believe that travel leads to a deeper cultural understanding and compassion and therefore a better world.

Customer Reviews

For Venice - anything but Lonely Planet. Sorry.
Some devoted followers of Lonely Planet will immediately click "NOT HELPFUL" to avenge this comment, I am sorry if this reviews disappoints you, but one has to be honest, right?

Yes, I admit I am not the greatest fan of Lonely Planet - although I recognize there are destinations where no-one does the trick better than this cheap-and-nasty house of publishing. In Africa, for example, Lonely Planet was the best guide available. But Venice, this magical and charming little patch of magic in the Adriatic? This guide is a joke, but I am not laughing.

The book is more concerned with righting the world than with doing its job. Do you want to read more of the same moans about evils of international tourism and how irresponsible travellers are ruining the world? If the answer is yes, go buy this book. It will certainly accomplish the mission of ruining all the enjoyment of travel to one of the most beautiful cities in the world.

However, if you need a travel guide, not a campaign newsletter, you will be better off with another book. A book which might tell you that all the tourist crowds in Venice occupy perhaps five percent of the city's territory, while the rest is the real Venice with people getting on with their lives, buying groceries in small shops and hanging their washing outside, Italian-style. Another book may show you how charming, how crazily enchanting and breathtakingly delicate this city is.

Maybe with another book you will realize that all the alarmist moans about Venice which will die in five/ten/fifteen years unless tourism is banned are just another shameless exagerrations, concocted by scaremongers and killjoys.

Writing is excessively dry and is difficult to follow or enjoy. I find it hard to believe that a reviewer was pleased with maps - they are just sad and amateurish, worse than anything that I have seen in my life, aside from Lonely Planet Iceland and Greenland, which is and probably will be the world champion of poor mapping.

This guide is not a match for Eyewitness or Fodor's, it does not even come close to being a good guidebook. Do yourself a favor - buy something else.

Not as good as Eyewitness
Although this guide book did have useful information and was small and easy to carry, I thought our Eyewitness Venice travel guide was much better. The Lonely Planet descriptions seemed to tell me about everything that was going badly in Venice and focused very little on the beautiful and positive side of the city. I would recommend checking out the Eyewitness book instead.

An excellent travel guide
The guide itself - like most Lonely Planet guides - is divided into basically two parts: First, things to know before you go, like history, geography and climate as well as information about visas, customs, money, health, etc. Second, the "traditional" description of places, monuments and museums as well as tips of where to stay and where to eat. The book is written in a casual way that makes reading easy, but still gives precise information when needed. On my last trip to Venice I found that almost all prices, opening times and other details where up to date. Another detail I liked was that some recommended hotels had their e-mail addresses in the guide. It made advance reservation so easy, and I am not talking about a Hilton, but a midrange hotel. One point that some people might find offensive is that sometimes the authors don't hesitate to give their personal opinion about politics, lifestyle, etc. But if you just take it for what it is, an opinion, and are able to go, see for your self, and make up your own mind, than this travel guide is for you. I really recommend it.