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The travel agent booked our lodging in Mestre!

DH booked a trip from Groupon that has us staying in Mestre for the Venice leg of our trip. I'm envisioning an inconvenient arrangement and would rather be in Venice for our short 2 day time there 02 Dec-04 Dec. Has anyone else stayed in Mestre and commuted into Venice for day trips? How mucch of a pain is this going to be or should I just look at it as one more travel adventure?

Posted by
4731 posts

If possible, changing to a hotel in Venice would be better. If not, don't worry -- it is not mission impossible. A pain in the anatomy? Yes. A time consumer? Yes. But thousands of locals commute in every day. Just go with the flow and pretend you are a local. All you have to do is get a bus to P. Roma or a local train to the station in Venice. TC

Posted by
7209 posts

And that's why we don't use Travel Agents! Mestre is not Venice. Mestre is just a city on the mainland, and you'll have to commute back and forth. It's not a huge detriment although yes, it's inconvenient and annoying. I mistakenly stayed in Mestre on my first Venice journey because I wasn't smart enough to know there was a difference. Unless you just positively can't afford it, I would bite the bullet and reserve a room at a "real" Venetian hotel on the island.

Posted by
4152 posts

I agree, I would try to rebook but if you can't it's not the end of the world. Just take it one day at a time and enjoy Venice.

Donna

Posted by
5697 posts

Just a question -- where did the "travel agent" fit in here ? You say it was a trip from Groupon, so was that a package trip that included a Mestre hotel for the "Venice" portion ?

Posted by
7737 posts

Sounds to me like it was DH and not a travel agent that made the booboo. You can make it work, but you'll quickly see why most visitors to Venice prefer to stay on the island.

Posted by
16028 posts

Since itis a Groupon my guess is it cannot be changed.

Looks like you have two nights, which means one full day in Venice. Plan on spending all of it in Venice, so take what you need for the day and evening with you from the hotel. I would prefer the bus to Piazzale Roma over the train, simply because it is so much easier to board the vaporetto at Piazzale Roma, but perhaps in December than it not an issue. Head straight to San Marco to see the basilica and doges' palace first, then spend the rest of the day wandering the streets and canals,bwith breaks as need for lunch and dinner.

Posted by
15043 posts

It's not the end of the world, even if you are unable to make changes. If your Mestre hotel is close to the station, the train takes less than 10 minutes to cross the bridge to the Venice Santa Lucia station, right on the Grand Canal. The cost is €1.50, I think, and trains are frequent. Even if you miss the last train (@ 12:30am), you still have the taxi option from Piazzale Roma to Mestre (about €20).

Unfortunately that is the risk when you use travel agents, many of which don't know what they are doing. Years ago some acquaintances of mine from California used a travel agent to organize their trip to Rome and Florence. After a few days in Rome, the travel agent put them on an Alitalia flight from Fiumicino to Florence at a round trip cost of several hundred dollars each. The trip by plane, hotel to hotel, took them over five hours. If they had asked me or anybody with some sense, they would have made that trip on a train at 1/5 of the cost and less than half the time.

Posted by
3 posts

To clear up the confusion, it was a Groupon deal for a trip package advertising Venice, Florence, Rome. We talked to the travel agency booking the trip to ask for extensions and request specific hotels and were told that no alterations were possible without paying a huge penalty. I think the lesson here is don't fall for the Groupon deal, it ain't as great as it looks. Caviate emptor, live and learn, read it and weep, etc. we are going to make the best of it we can.

Posted by
10344 posts

Ah, so the the Travel Agent was not quite the Bad Guy, in this case, it appears.
Some first timers to the area might not figure out, in advance, the big difference between staying in Mestre versus staying in Venice, when planning their itinerary, if they haven't previously been to Venice.
Perhaps yet another confirmation of: "If it looks too good to be true, it probably is"?

Posted by
16028 posts

I suggested the bus tonPiazzalemRoma as that is by fr the better place to board the vaporetto. Itis where the line originates and they would have a good chance of boarding first and getting a spot outside ( assuming good weather) for th"cruise" down the Grand Canal. The vaporetto stop at the train station is very crowded and the ticket lines can be very long. That stop now has turnstile-guarded entry onto the boarding dock, activated by a ticket or a pass. You still need to validate before boarding.

But if their hotel is close to the train station, it makes more sense to take the train into Venice. They can still get to Piazzale Roma. Turn right from the station and head for the new ( modern and controversial) Ponte della Constituzione. Piazzale Roma is just on the other side. Stop at the top of the bridge for a view down the canal.

Younwouldprobably do best to buy the €18 12-hour passes for the vaporetti. If you take even three rides, you are ahead. You can buy these from machines or the ticket office ( I can't remember which the Piazzale Rome stop has, maybe both). If a machine, we found it easier to use cash than our "true" chip and PIN card. Go figure. The machines will return up to € 10 in change. So for two passes you could pruning €40 and it will give you €4 change.

Posted by
7130 posts

You might be tempted to head back to Mestre early in the evening because of your hotel location. Evenings & mornings are wonderful in Venice, especially after the day-crowds have departed. Be sure to stay on the island area as much as possible!

Posted by
55 posts

If you booked the trip with Groupon, you were looking for a deal. Part of looking for a deal is living with its limitations. Get into Venice early, leave it late, and think about how much more all of those other suckers are paying to stay there (some of them in really lousy accomodations) per night.

You're going to have a great time. Make the most of it.

Posted by
16893 posts

When taking the regional train connection between stations, the tickets are not dated, so you must remember to date-stamp each one in the validation box before entering the track area.

Posted by
2 posts

Right. Mestre is not the most beautiful place in the world, we all agree on that. Still, it does have some plus, first of all prices. Apart from the fact that you got a Groupon offer, hotels' prices in Mestre are much cheaper than Venice.
Moreover, the connections between the mainland and the floating city are very frequent: as Tim rightly said, locals commute every day back and forth either by bus or train.
However, not to put you down, Mestre has nothing to do with Venice which is unique.
Anyway, I recommend you to pay a visit to a typical restaurant in Mestre ((to be more precise it is located in Marghera, which is a part of Mestre): it's called Osteria Al Diplomatico and, in my opinion, it's one of the best places I've been to in Italy. There you will find locals mainly enjoying the great wine list and the superb selection of cicchetti they serve (cichetti are small delicious side dishes that you MUST accompany with a good local wine). In Italy the aperitif break from 7pm onwards is a tradition and this osteria is the best place to get to know this habit.
Also, if you are more familiar with anglophone habits, I'd recommend a pub called Marciano where you can taste typical continental food re-interpreted in Italian style.
(For reviews on both of them, check Tripadvisor).
Don't worry and just enjoy your trip. Next time, you'll do better ;)