Visiting Venice: How to Fall for a Cliched City

Alyssa Hollingsworth | July 13, 2016

Highlights of the Doge Palace include:

The “Scudo” Room: A long stateroom with maps across the walls depicting every place Venice touched in trade or war.

The Council of Ten’s room: Where the super sketchy, very mysterious Council of Ten would meet. If you take the Secret Itineraries Tour, you get to enter through the hidden door and visit the places where the most prominent prisoners were kept. This includes Don Juan, who famously climbed out the window of his attic cell and then walked out of the building.

The prison: Crossing from the glory of the state rooms into the bare-walled, dank, cold prison cells is quite the change. As you enter the building again, you’ll walk over the Bridge of Sighs–the place where prisoners bound for death would get their last look at Venice.

The Chamber of the Great Council: As you progress through the palace, every room seems grander than the one before. My friend and I thought many times that we had reached the climax of the tour experience, but we were so very wrong. This room, bigger than any sane person’s house, is the real show-stopper.

The Doge’s Palace takes a long time to move through, especially if you’re reading the info as you go. So plan accordingly!

Alyssa Hollingsworth / Own Work

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