Venice with disabilities

Does your husband have trouble walking, or just with stairs?

You might do well to stay near a vaporetto stop, although the boats have a couple of steps.

Get a good map that shows sights as well as vaporetto stops (but the pass for as many days as you will be there - 24-hour periods). Plan your routes and be prepared to take the long way 'round some of the time.

I just found a website, sagetraveling, that might be useful.

I visited Venice with my 80+ year old mom who also has difficulty with stairs and found the sagetraveling website very helpful. We managed to avoid most of the bridges & rode on the vaporetto up & down the Grand Canal.

Enjoy!

I found this B&B near the San Zaccaria Vaporetto stop: "B&B 3C" (Castello 4544, right off Calle delle Razze). I mapped it using Google and it is a very easy walk from the vaporetto stop and convenient to the Doge Palace and St. Mark's Basilica.

Thanks! Especially appreciate the Sage Traveling website.

To answer your question, in our case walking long distances would be problematic, but walking a few blocks at a time is fine. And, as Sage Traveling points out, Venice doesn't have cobblestones or hills.

I take it there's no major problem with loud late-night partying? The RS guide refers to the Dorsoduro neighborhood as "quieter," but I'm not sure if that just means it has fewer tourists or if by comparison the more touristy neighborhoods are noisy like -- for example -- the Temple Bar section of Dublin.

The only night time sounds that I usually hear from the window of the various hotels in which I have stayed in various parts of Venice are the gondoliers and their passengers passing near by and the bells of the nearest churches.

In the hotels on or near the Grand Canal I can also often hear the ballet of the working boats and vaporettos. Yes, I know that the simile is unusual, but for many years ballet is the only way I can describe the movements of all the different boats.

One exception, but you won't stay at the Pensione Guerrato because it is all stairs and no lift, in addition to the ballet the mornings get the sounds of the Market (except the weekend) and in the late afternoon into the evening until about 11 on Friday and Saturday evenings the sounds come up of the party in the market area.

Know that the north bank of the Grand Canal has many fewer bridges/stairs. I remember walking on that side back to the train station and it was less scenic, but much quicker and easier.

Hope to visit Italy in Sept or Oct 2017, including Venice.

You haven't mentioned where else you're going? Aside from bridges being potential obstacles in Venice, in Italy there are many accommodations in older buildings which do not have lifts to rooms on upper floors, and many restaurants with their restrooms down flights of stairs in the basements. It's worth the mention as you'll want to be cautious about your hotel bookings if stairs are a challenge? Be sure that yours either have a lift or rooms available on the ground floor. What is considered the first floor in the U.S. is the 2nd floor in Italy.

And make use of the most accessible facilities whenever they're available! :O)

or put another way, the entrance floor has different names in different parts of Europe, but in much of Europe it will be indicated by zero on the buttons in the lift (elevator) - except France (often RC for Rez de Chaussée). The first floor above that is the European first floor, indicated in the lift by 1.

American chain hotels will often have "G" instead of zero but then take up with 1,2,3 etc. above that.

Can he walk up and down inclines? One benefit of going in October is that they put up ramps over the 13-14 bridges along the Venice Marathos route. The Marathon will be October 22 in 2017, but they put up the ramps a couple of weeks ahead. We have seen them the last two times we were there in October.

You can see a photo of them here:

http://www.ablogaboutvenice.com/single-post/2016/09/27/The-Venice-Marathon-23-October-2016

You can google the Marathon route and see where the ramps will be ( mainly along the Zattere in Dorsoduro and Riva Degli Schiavoni in San Marco). They were useful to my 89-year-old brother-in -law when we all went to Venice in 2015. He booked a hotel with an elevator and pretty much step-free access from the Ca' d'Oro vaporetto stop; this worked well for him.

Thanks for these additional suggestions -- especially about the ramps for the marathon in October! Did not know about that.

We'll only be staying in two other cities (Florence and Rome) and I always look for a hotel with an elevator or request a ground-floor room, though it's OK if we have to climb one flight of stairs as long as it has a sturdy railing. We are familiar with the European numbering of building floors, but thanks for the details which I'm sure will also be helpful for others.

In Venice, my parents and I enjoyed the ground floor room at the popular Casa Rezzonico hotel, which is a level walk from the similarly named vaporetto stop. I believe it had just 2 or 3 steps from the "street" to reception. Several good restaurants nearby around Campo S. Barnaba. Also (I think) a level walk to the Guidecca Canal, if you want to go that direction. One bridge to reach additional restaurants and market day on Campo S. Margarita.

I have also stayed behind San Marco on Calle delle Razze. It's a short walk to those sites or to vaporettos, although you have one bridge to reach San Marco and one bridge to reach about half of the vaporetto lines

Wonderful, thank you all so much! When we get our dates nailed down I will check out the hotels you have recommended.