Walks of Italy Venice Tours

We did the Walks Venice in a Day tour and were extremely lucky to have Iole as our tour guide. Iole is a local Venetian and an amazing guide.

We started bright and early near Rialto Bridge and Iole spent a few hours showing us around the island and telling us about modern life as a Venetian, including what it's like to shop at a local fish market and how garbage in Venice gets collected (it's more interesting than you'd think, trust me). We eventually made it to a gondola station near St. Mark's for our included gondola ride, which was fun but not quite how gondolas are portrayed in the movies. A must-do Venice experience nonetheless.

After lunch break Iole started the history portion of the tour, which included a visit inside Saint Mark's Basilica and finally a tour around the Doge's palace, which is downright amazing. Iole's knowledge of the building and the art was extremely impressive.

Even though it's called Venice in a Day it doesn't take all day - more like 6 hours. But it packs a ton into a relatively short time. I appreciate being able to sign up for one tour and not have to worry about navigating tickets for the various sites or gondola. Getting a great guide like Iole was icing on the cake.

We visited during low season and were lucky to have a relatively small group of 11, though I understand Walks takes up to 20 people on this tour which they still call a "small group" though I think more than 15 would...

To really get an amazing experience of Venice, We highly recommend Walks of Italy Venice Tours! Not only will you see beautiful spots of Venice, you will also see amazing spots that aren’t really known to tourists! Giuliano was our expert and being born in Venice made his vast knowledge and expertise second to none! Giuliano guided us through both the popular sites, but also through hidden gems throughout Venice that you would never had known existed! On top of that Giuliano was a walking Wikipedia, giving us beautiful stories of the history of Venice and how it became the centre of the world! His guidance gave us a picturesque view of Venice and made us truly admire and fall in love with a magnificent city!

No cars, no bikes, only foot traffic! Venice is best served with a hint of exploration and a big dose of expectation - the food, people and sites are breathtaking! Giuliano made our stay in Venice a dream come true! With added audio support through wearable radios, you can hear Giuliano crystal clear wherever you were during the tour.

We highly recommend City Experiences - you won’t regret it! Grazie Mille Giuliano for your...

The tour itself was interesting and our guide was very knowledgeable. I'm sure choosing the after-hours option saved us plenty of unpleasantness compared with trying to visit these sites in the daytime heat and crowds. Unfortunately, our experience was less enjoyable than it could have been because our guide did not hold herself or other members of the group to the scheduled time. Due to a change in the schedule, we'd been led to expect we'd have enough time between the two parts of the tour to get dinner, but she let the first part run over, so the break was long, but not quite long enough to get a meal. The second part also ran so late that we were herded out by security as St. Mark's was closing. And she still kept talking once we got outside! The entire experience ended up being over 4 1/2 hours long (advertised as 3 1/2) and most of it was standing. By hour 3 we were getting too tired and hungry to absorb or appreciate much of the good information being shared, and by hour 4 we were mentally and physically cooked. The content was fascinating and the sites are beautiful, so it's a shame we didn't leave with a more positive feeling...