SEARCHING FOR Venice

The key to unlocking the essence of this most romantic of Italian cities is to get lost in it, writes LEE TULLOCH.

- LEE TULLOCH

To really discover Venice, you need to get lost.

Don't worry, it's not hard. The city is built across an archipelago of 118 islands, most of them linked by narrow canals, centuries-old bridges and the vaporetto, or ferries, that zigzag across the lagoon and waterways carrying passengers to the city's farthest reaches. Turn any corner on foot and you're likely to end up at a bridge, a square or a dead end. In many of these ancient streets, GPS doesn't work, and maps are often indecipherable.

Venice was once the richest and most powerful city in the world, and its architecture is achingly beautiful, made more poignant by its fragility and slow disintegration into the sea. Venice's palazzos, museums and churches dazzle with art and treasures. It's the city of Bellinis, gondolas, Carnevale and cicchetti. No wonder it is being loved to death by tourists.

But if you stick only to the time-worn paths, you'll miss the essence of the city.

Away from the areas heaving with tourists, notably St Mark's square, where groups from cruise ships traipse behind guides waving umbrellas, Venice feels like a different place altogether, much more human, where people hang their laundry in the street and buy their vegetables off barges, meet their neighbours in wide piazzas at night, and take their nightly passeggiata in parks and on waterfront promenades far from where tourists venture.

It's only a matter of walking away from the main centre, or taking a short vaporetto ride, to find yourself in places the day trippers don't reach. If you buy the handy, inexpensive Venezia Unica water bus pass, you have unlimited opportunities to travel easily to different neighbourhoods via the main canals, and to many far-flung islands as well. It's a city defined by water, so there isn't a more Venetian thing to do than get around by boat, whether it's a ferry or cheap local gondolas called traghetto (the latter can be a bit of a wild ride).