Venice - St Mark's Square

Seeing as we had only one night in Venice and the next day's walking tour wouldn't cover the highly touristy places, we used another Rick Steves audio guide to show us around. It was actually pretty empty - pro tip for avoiding the crowds: go when it's cold and dark! :P
There were still the small bands playing at the restaurants (#1) and we saw just the outside of St Mark's Basilica (#2) and the nearby Doge's palace (#3) and over-hyped bridge of sighs (#4).
On the way back to our hostel we stopped at a traditional Venetian restaurant for a sampling of cicheti (Venetian tapas, at Venetian prices, ouch!). Also there were lots of shops selling masks (to do with the historical Venetian Carnival) - I thought #6 was particularly creepy at night.Read more