What is it that makes Venice so special?

The old architecture? Oh yes, it’s nice, but Florence has also nice old building to show off. And Paris, And London… So no, it’s not just the architecture.

The channels maybe, they are so famous!? Yes, channels are nice, and peaceful. But… wait, Amsterdam, Bruges, Strasbourg… lost of other cities have nice channels too, so why Venice?

Is it a combo architecture + channels?

I don’t think so. All the cities I’ve mentioned with channels offer neighborhoods with nice architectures too.

Oh but yeah! That’s it! Neighborhoods. Those cities offer one or 2 nice neighborhoods, not a whole city of channels and nice architecture while Venice is 100% channels and architecture.

And what does it change?

I would say it changes everything.

You can spend a whole day strolling around without crossing any car or horse or bike… and it feels strangely right.

There’s no traffic jam (or maybe pedestrian trafic jam on the way to Saint Marc’s square, but not as much as I expected), no horn, no yelling… even on the channels, it looks like there’s enough place for everyone to be peaceful on the big channel while on the small ones the trafic signs make it easy to use.

No cars, no usual buses, no truck… but still life. It’s not a purely touristic city, you can see and feel that there’s a real day to day life in this city.

And when you look at it, this city feels peaceful, not as stressful as touristic cities with a lot of trafic jam and big buses full of tourists everywhere. Yes, there are quite some tourists in this romantic city, but, with so many little streets everywhere, you can easily walk for hours without crossing so many of them. Of course, it means you avoid Saint Marc’s surroundings, and so what?

There are so many beautiful and not so famous buildings everywhere!