Venice - catching an early morning train

It depends where you are located on the islands. Could be 15-20 minutes on the vaporetto plus the time waiting for one. Do you know the vaporetto stop where you will be staying? If yes, you can go to www.actv.it, select English and select water buses. You then put in the departure information. The train station stop is Ferrovia. I would put in 05:45am for the time. The system will tell you what vaporettos to take. Yes, they do run during the night but not as often.

Where are you going that you need such an early train? There are numerous trains leading out of Venice.

But, the great thing is that the vaporetto does run early. And you can walk to the train station in almost as little time from most parts of Venice.

You can find the vaporetto schedule online.

Dear Clint, you can't reserve a place on the vaporetto but don't worry, there will always be space (especially so early!). You can find their schedule at www.actv.it (the train station stop is Ferrovia) and that should tell you if they run early and exactly what boat you need depending on where you are staying and the time you wish to arrive at the station.

Depending on where you are staying, you can also walk to the train station (about 20 mins easy walking from the Rialto Bridge) but there are many bridges so with luggage this may not be an easy option. If travelling light, then it is a nice walk.

You should arrive at the station maybe 20 minutes before the train (if you already have your ticket) - gives you enough time to have a coffee, buy some food for the train and find your platform.

Oh, and one more thing - make sure to buy your ticket for the vaporetto the day before - some stops don't have ticket offices and in any case no ticket offices will be open so early! If they check you and you don't have your ticket, there will be a huge fine so be careful.

You can always buy a ticket from the crew on board the vaporetto. The person handling the lines and the gates can sell you one.