vaporetto day pass(s)

Jim - Be sure to count your change when you buy the passes. Some of the ticket sellers at the train station booth will slow count, but quickly cough up the exact shortfall when you point out their "mistake".

In their defense, I haven't heard of anyone complaining about the "slow count" from Venice's vaporetto ticket sellers.

One reason to buy the pass (in addition to paying for themselves in three rides) is that many stops don't have anyone selling tickets, so you have to pay on board which is inconvenient and somewhat chaotic when the boats are crowded.

Buy a pass as soon as you can, but don't validate until you're ready to board your first ride. That's when the clock starts.

Jim, get the pass. It's so much easier to hop on and off wherever you want than it is to buy individual tickets. As you come out of the Venezia Santa Lucia train station, look to the slight right along the Grand Canal and you will see a booth that sells the passes. Passes come in 12hr, 24hr, 36hr, 48hr and 72hr flavors.

Here are the fares:

14,00 € - 12-HOUR TRAVELCARD
16,00 € - 24-HOUR TRAVELCARD
21,00 € - 36-HOUR TRAVELCARD
26,00 € - 48-HOUR TRAVELCARD
31,00 € - 72-HOUR TRAVELCARD

Doug - I'm speaking from experience, and I seriously doubt that I'm the only person this man has tried to short change. On the other hand, you're right that most ticket sellers are honest. Just suggesting Jim be cautious when buying passes at that particular booth.

You may want to examine how much time you expect to use the vaporetto too. My wife and I knew that we were going to start one day by going to St. Michelle, Murano, and Burano. We also wanted to take the slow cruise of the canal from start to finish. So we bought our vaporetto pass (24 hour) in the evening at the train station and took a relaxing cruise (slow boat) through the canal. And then the next morning we used the same ticket to ride to the islands and back. But we knew we wouldn't use the ticket before or after those trips, which is why we went with the 24 hour pass. The rest of the time we just walked everywhere (even in the November rain).
A trip through the canals can be nice, but Venice should be explored with your feet on the ground whenever it can.
Regarding the slow count, etc... just come with a lot of different Euro denominations and pay with the exact amount. They're listed above.

Steve has exactly the correct answer. Vaporetto passes are not cheap and you really do not "need" them on the island of Venice. You really only "need" them if you want a trip to Murano, Burano, cruise down the Grand Canal,etc. Therefore if you can condense all of your Vaporetto riding into 1 24-hour segement then you will save a lot of money. That's exactly what we did and it turned out very nicely.

I think we purchased the 12 hour and made our way from Rialto vaporetto stop all the way to Murano and Burano and back. Yes, we walked all over Murano and had lunch, bought some glass. We also walked around Burano, but it is a much smaller island than Murano so it won't take near as long.

I agree you dont need a long term pass.We bought one at10:00am and used it to go to Murano,Burano and the slow trip on the Grand Canel.Then we used it to get from St.Marco to Piazza Roma to pick up our rental car.

Eli,
The only reason we did the 24 hour pass was because we wanted to cruise the canal in the evening and do the islands the following day. It worked well since the museums were closing around 5:00 in November when we were there. But if you're going to only hit the islands, then 12 hours will do you just fine. Depending on your pace, you should be able to do the islands in the morning until early afternoon and then take the slow cruise later in the evening before it expires. The 12 hours starts when you stamp it before your first departure. So if that's ~8:00AM, you've got until 8:00PM before it expires.

We've been to Venice 3 times, and completely believe in the vaporetto pass- here's why:

For us, Venice is exciting, stimulating, but also very crowded; for a break from the madding crowd, we'd jump on a vaporetto, rest and ride, on our way to a less busy area- disembark, perhaps get a glass of wine or spuntino, relax for a while - then jump on another, and be dropped off in the middle of all the action again; proves significantly less stressful.