About
Venice is a city in northern Italy, the capital of the region Veneto, and has a population of 271,251. Together with Padua, the city is included in the Padua-Venice Metropolitan Area. Venice has been known as the "La Dominante", "Serenissima", "Queen of the Adriatic", "City of Water", "City of Bridges", and "The City of Light". The city stretches across 118 small islands in the marshy Venetian Lagoon along the Adriatic Sea in northeast Italy. The saltwater lagoon stretches along the shoreline between the mouths of the Po (south) and the Piave (north) Rivers.

The Venetian Republic was a major maritime power during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and a staging area for the Crusades and the Battle of Lepanto, as well as a very important center of commerce (especially silk, grain and spice trade) and art in the 13th century up to the end of the 17th century.

Venice is Europe's largest urban car free area, unique in Europe in remaining a sizable functioning city in the 21st century entirely without motorcars or trucks. The classical Venetian boat is the gondola, although it is now mostly used for tourists, or for weddings, funerals, or other ceremonies. Most Venetians now travel by motorised waterbuses (vaporetti) which ply regular routes along the major canals and between the city's islands. The city also has many private boats. The only gondolas still in common use by Venetians are the traghetti, foot passenger ferries crossing the Grand Canal at certain points without bridges. Visitors can also take the watertaxis between areas of the city.

Venice is served by the newly rebuilt Marco Polo International Airport, or Aeroporto di Venezia Marco Polo, named in honor of its famous citizen. The airport is on the mainland and was rebuilt away from the coast; however, the water taxis or Alilaguna waterbuses to Venice are only a seven-minute walk from the terminals. Some airlines market Treviso Airport in Treviso, 20km from Venice, as a Venice gateway. Some simply advertise flights to "Venice" without naming the actual airport except in the small print.

Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute Placed scenically at a narrow finger of land, the basilica's decorative and distinctive profile and location make it among the most photographed churches in Italy.

Palazzo Ducale Now preserved as a museum and once visited and described by Mark Twain, the gothic palace has paintings by Tintoretto and Veronese. The current one was largely constructed from 1309 to 1424.

Piazza San Marco Also called as "The drawing room of Europe", the square is one of the few great urban spaces in Europe where human voices prevail over the sounds of motorized traffic.

[source: wikipedia.org ]