I booked a stay in this hotel for the bank holiday weekend 24-26th May based on the reviews from tripadvisor through Venere.com and we absolutely loved our stay.
The hotel is located in a very quiet area in Venice but it is very close to everything at the same time! About 5-10 minutes walk to San Marco's square (depending on how quick you walk) and the Rialto bridge is a walking distance too.
About the hotel, the reception staff were very helpful and spoke very good English especially the manager, Marina and Laura was nice and sent us an email confirming our booking as soon as we booked the room and most importantly gave us the best map of Venice and showed us exactly where to go for tours and how to come back to the hotel on the map.
The breakfast was continental but very nice, providing cheese,butter, different types of jam, tinned peaches, cereal, meusli, peach and orange juice, yoghurts, croissants, bread rolls and tea and coffee. One day they provided pie too.
Our room was clean and spacious and it overlooked a very small stream or canal and it was very quiet. The TV was small and all the channels were Italian but it was no big deal as we came back late every night and we were too tired to watch TV.
There are no tea or coffee facilities in the room but we asked for tea one night and the chap at reception prepared it for us free of charge.
We booked for 3 tours from the hotel: the original walking tour, it was very nice where they showed us the important places in the city including St Marco, Rialto, Santa Maria Formosa, ....etc. but it is 2 hours and most of the time we were standing so you will need very good shoes and a good night's sleep too.
The 2nd tour was the boat trip, where we were taken by a water taxi around the grand canal and they showed us the history behind some of the buildings and it was very nice too, different from the walking tour so I would recommend both.
The 3rd tour was the Ghost walk in the evening that starts from the Rialto, it was nice and they took us to hidden places in the alleys (calle) and talked about people who died and stories about them.
These were all booked from the hotel where they have brouchure's and you can choose any tour you want but alternatively you can go yourself to the starting point and book them yourself.
They booked the trip to Murano for us and we went for that one again but because I read the previous reviews I knew exactly what to expect: They collected us from the hotel and took us there by water taxi and showed us the glass factory and it was very interesting to watch but afterwards we walked through the gallery or the display area and we enjoyed looking around. However, everything was very expensive and overpriced and when you finish walking around they lead you to the exit door and that's it! the trip is free GOING there but you have to go back on your own. If you wanted to take the Vaparotti back to San Marco when you go out of the exit TURN RIGHT and there is a vaparotti stop around the corner but if you want to look around in Murano there is a nice glass sculpture if you turn left and walk around the river or canal and small glass shops but we didn't buy anything because it was all quite expensive and we were advised to buy from Burano which we didn't have the time to go to! Maybe in our next visit.
We bought 2 day tickets for the vaparotti (water bus) as recommended by others but there was something we noticed that no one mentioned before: although we had the tickets no one ever asked us for them! People seemed to go on the boats for free! Don't take my word for it but I am telling you nobody ever asked us for tickets neither there were any machines to check if they were valid! However, when we were going back from St Zaccaria stop we saw a woman asking people to show tickets and that was the only time it happened in the 3rd day of our stay.
The trip to and from the airport was different, they asked for the tickets before you entered and half-way through which was 12 euros pp but it is a good hour to and from venice.
If you are staying in Venice and you like the beach take a trip to Lido where they have nice beaches which are sandy.
We didn't have any problems comminicating because it is a touristy area and most of the locals spoke English.
I forgot to mention the gondola, you have to go on a gondola if you are in Venice! Expensive but absolutely worth it! Go after 8:00pm because it is magical.