Venice is the only great city in Europe where your motorcycle is entirely useless. The road ends at Piazzale Roma, at the end of a long bridge across the lagoon, and from there on, everything happens on foot or by boat. The city and its lagoon are listed by UNESCO as a whole, a recognition that the islands, the canals, the salt marshes and the fishing villages form a single living system, shaped by over a thousand years of human effort to keep the sea out and the city afloat.
The ride in is part of the experience. The Ponte della Libertà , built in the 1930s next to the older railway bridge, carries you across the open water from Mestre, with the city rising ahead, its towers and domes catching the light. At Piazzale Roma and the nearby Tronchetto island there are multi-storey car parks, some with space for motorcycles, but they fill up fast in summer and are not cheap. If you want to keep riding, the car ferry from Tronchetto to the Lido lets you take your bike to the long island that separates the lagoon from the sea, with roads, beaches and the old Venice Film Festival buildings.
Once on foot, Venice is a labyrinth of narrow streets, bridges and squares, and getting lost is the whole point. The Grand Canal, St Mark's Square, the Rialto bridge and the Doge's Palace are the obvious highlights, but the quieter districts, Cannaregio, Castello, the Giudecca, are where Venetians still live. The islands of the lagoon, Murano with its glass, Burano with its colourful houses and lace, and Torcello with its ancient cathedral, are reachable by vaporetto, the water bus.
Fuel is available in Mestre and on the mainland; there is none on the main islands. Venetian food is distinctive: cicchetti, small snacks served with a glass of wine in bacari, sarde in saor, sweet and sour sardines, risotto with cuttlefish ink and liver with onions. Coffee at the counter is cheap; coffee at a table on St Mark's Square is a famous extravagance. Come out of season if you can, in late autumn or winter, when mist lies on the canals and the city is quieter. And remember that your bike is waiting for you at Piazzale Roma, and the mainland roads are wide open.