Traghetto

ABOVE: A traghetto, or gondola parada, arrives on the Dorsoduro side of the Grand Canal.

By Durant Imboden

Until 1854, the Ponte di Rialto was the only bridge across the Grand Canal in Venice. Even now, there are only four bridges along the canal's 2.5-mile (3.5 km) length. If you need to cross the canal and you aren't near a bridge, you have two choices:

• Take the No. 1 vaporetto, which zig-zags from one bank to the other as it follows the Grand Canal, or better yet:

• Head for the nearest traghetto pier and get rowed to the other side. As a tourist, you'll be expected to pay €2,-- (nearly three times the residents' rate of 70 cents).

Traghetto (plural: traghetti) means "ferry" in Italian. On Venice's Grand Canal, traghetti are the passenger boats that cross the canal at seven points between the railroad station and St. Mark's Basin.

A traghetto, also called a gondola parada, carries up to 10 passengers (compared to five for a privately-hired gondola da nolo). The boats eschew bow decoration, brocaded chairs, and other luxury trimmings. They are rowed by two oarsmen: one who stands behind the passengers like a traditional gondolier, the other closer to the bow.

Most traghetti have been operated by the same families for generations. As recently as the 1950s, there were some 30 of these gondola ferry routes. Today, there are just over half a dozen official routes, although you'll be lucky if you find more than two, three, or four operating at any given time. Two of the most reliable are:

Pescaria (Rialto fish market) - Santa Sofia (near Ca' d'Oro):

San Tomà - Sant'Angelo:

Two other routes are convenient and operate with some regularity:

• Giglio, from the gondola station by the Gritti Palace Hotel to Calle Lanza in Dorsoduro (near the Salute Church)

• Dogana, from a pier near the tip of Dorsoduro to San Marco Vallaresso.

Other official routes are still marked on maps, but service can range from sporadic to non-existent:

• Fondamente S. Lucia (in front of the railroad station) - Fondamenta San Simeón Piccolo

• San Marcuola - Fóndaco dei Turchi (by the Natural History Museum)

• Riva del Carbòn - Fondamente del Vin

• San Samuele - Ca' Rezzónico

• Note: Traghetto routes are clearly marked on some Venice street maps (look for straight lines across the Grand Canal), and you'll often see signs on buildings pointing toward the traghetto landings when you're walking through neighborhoods along the Grand Canal.