Northern Italy motorhome - including Venice!

We have just come back from a whistle-stop trip down through France to Italy and back. Why? Well mainly to get to Venice. Venice is one of those places that we never thought we would visit, maybe because it's so touristy and expensive. 

Wendy in St Marks' Square, Venice

However, having had a look at the map, although it's on the other side of Italy, it is northern and Italy is so narrow that it's much nearer than we first thought. Add to that, the excellent cheap and reliable Italian train system meant that we were able to drive less and use the trains more than we would in other European countries.

The route we took was down through France using the aires. We over-nighted at the medieval walled city of Provins on night 1 and then onto Suerre on another free aire on the banks of the Saone. Day 3 of driving got us down near the Italian border ready for a crossing via the Mont Blanc tunnel.

A one-way ticket costs around 50 euros (75 for a return). You can queue for ages here but at this time of year we sailed through. Entry to the tunnel is strictly controlled for safety purposes to minimise the amount of traffic in the 11km tunnel at any one time. You also have to keep a 150m gapo between you and the car in front.

You are well into (and under) the Alps by now and having been stuck in them even in May due to the passes still be closed, we were happy to pay the toll charges to stay on the motorway that cuts a lower straighter path. Italian tolls are actually very reasonable.

Gondolas on the Grand Canal

After a night in an Alpine campsite where we were the only ones on, we headed for Lake Garda. There are loads of options for visits around here including Milan, Turin and Verona. We opted for the smaller but much raved about Verona, which we found to be compact enough to have a comfortable day seeing the sights.

The site we stayed on was called Butterfly and was on the very bottom of the lake. We highly recommend it not least for the excellent staff. The site is around 300 metres to the local train station from where we were able to travel the 125km into Venice for just ten euros each (and the same to get back).

Venice has to be seen to be believed. It is like stepping into a movie set. It is just like you see on the TV or in a film. Hundreds of narrow canals, gondalas vying for position with water taxis, delivery boats and tourist boats. It's busy, noisy, crowded and expensive. However, it's also possible to find yourself a quiet corner and cheap(ish) cafe if you look hard enough.

The Rialto Bridge

The highlights are St Mark's Square and the Rialto Bridge, but to be honest, the main attraction is just wandering the narrow paths around the canals and watching the world go by. We were completely exhausted after wandering around for about 7 hours. In all that time we didn't actually go in anywhere as we wanted to see as much of the city as we could and the weather was about 20 degrees (not bad for the end of March).

You could happily spend 4 or 5 days here if you had the budget and wanted to take advantage of the various museums and other attractions. We were happy with the one day though as we felt we really got a taste of the city as a whole.