Enjoy a 9-hour romantic cruise among the Venetian Villas of the Brenta Riviera, a trip through art and history by Burchiello boat. The cruise departs from Venice and ends in Padua.
Posted By : DEREK_W
Beautiful tour, very knowledgeable host. Would recommend the pizzeria in the town where you stop for lunch.
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Posted On : 2024-06-19 13:06:50 
Posted By : 90sirpam
Best way to travel, if you are interested in seeing different beautiful villas of Venetian elite from time when Venice declined as Mediterranean power and they turned inland. You will hear good guides tell about history. The combination of three quite different villas is interesting. And you’ll learn about locks and turnbridges of river cruises.
You should know in advance that most likely the stretch from last villa to Padova will be covered by bus. If you stay in Padova, you can go yourself to look at the landing stairs area behind hotel Galileo. It has remained as it was, now university area and nice piazza with restaurants.
If you are not sure of using the whole day, you can travel to beautiful Villa Foscari from Venice by local traffic quickly. Don’t trust Google Maps advice, check official route planner apps or ask for advice which bus to take from Piazzale Roma.
I travelled solo. The previous evening I got message that Il Burchiello needed repairs and I needed to get on my own to first destination Villa Foscari on Venice local traffic. Another boat would continue. Their advice how to get to Villa Foscari was wrong - the bus dropped me on highway one hour’s walk away from Villa Foscari. I arrived there in time, but exhausted. After all, Il Burchiello arrived there and trip continued on it.
Therefore I would strongly advise to take your booking through a service that provides you with support and advice in case the company refuses to take responsibility for part of the trip you have paid for. You need the support both for advice for optional travel arrangements and for requesting due treatment. I made a complaint, but the direction of the company didn’t offer apology, discount or compensation.
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Posted On : 2024-06-15 02:40:04 
Posted By : JeanMarc_B
Cool tour to discover the country side. A bit long as the boat cannot go very fast. Happy with the guide , Olympia.
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Posted On : 2024-05-31 15:53:44
Posted By : benedettas302
Beautiful experience, very well organized tour. Even though my friend was about to fall into the water when boarding in Venice, the on-board staff was prompt and efficient to avoid the worst. The visits to the three villas were interesting, the guides Olimpia and Emma were really very good. Overall, great day.
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Posted On : 2024-05-26 09:43:52
Posted By : antoniofS8770JW
Well organized and recommended trip. We were lucky enough to have an excellent guide (Silvia) who made the trip very interesting
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Posted On : 2024-05-19 10:58:37
Posted By : Fearless15030908666
Very long...sometimes tedious...boat trip along the Brenta canal. Not terribly interesting scenery. It was lousy weather and heavy rain so we were stuck inside the boat for half the time. But even with good weather I think the long boat trip would have been tedious! The villas were interesting and the guide was good.
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Posted On : 2024-05-08 03:27:46
Posted By : MikaTravels
We were so disappointed in this tour. It started out well with a small number of people on the boat and good narration as we left Venice but the day went downhill from there.
The boat was exceptionally slow and tedious with way too much time spent looking at the weeds along the shore. Why were we stuck looking at weeds all day? Because the tour operators do not manage the use of space on the boat. At the stop for lunch, as we got off and went into the restaurant a group of 60 joined the tour. They rushed onto the boat and took 100% of the seats on the top of the boat while we were eating. We hadn’t been able to comfortably sit up top during the AM as the day started with overcast skies and it was too cold to be out. However, by the time lunch was over it was nice enough to be up top but we had no option of sitting there.
When we stopped at the 2nd villa of the day the guides made zero effort to ensure those who hadn’t been up top had a chance to enjoy that space as we rebounded to go to the third and final villa. Instead, during the visit to the 2nd villa they let people leave their personal things on the chairs which meant we once again had no option but to sit downstairs looking at the weeds. It was SO BORING.
Part of the problem is that this old boat is not well designed for viewing from inside. In the front there are two metal bars that cut across the view out the front windows. All of the seats inside are very low so if you aren’t very tall it isn’t easy to get a good view out of the windows (hence everyone’s interest in the seats on top).
The organizers should ensure that the number of guests is not greater than the number of chairs on the top.
In addition, the toilet on the boat is very substandard and it, along with the rest of the boat needs a lot of updating.
We purchased lunch with this tour for 25E pp. The timing on the day meant the lunch was very rushed but the food was okay (not stellar, but okay). The toilets in the restaurant left much to be desired with only 2 stalls for women with one not working and the stalls in the men’s were squat toilets.
The narration was in both English and Italian which made for a lot of speaking over the PA system but the guides were very fluent in each language and they tried to make it interesting. However, just naming and pointing out the many villas that were passed was not useful (especially on the last leg which was done by bus as the villas were passed too quickly to get a good look at them). It would be better to just focus on the villas visited with more detailed information about them as we sailed (to complement the narration inside the villas).
The cost of this trip was not warranted given the condition of the boat or the quality of the onboard experience although I suspect that those who hogged the upper deck chairs all afternoon had a much better experience.
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Posted On : 2024-05-05 10:50:49
Posted By : Alex_A
DO NOT BOOK. It regrettably marked the most challenging aspect of my two-week journey in Italy.
Initially, I had reserved a total of 12 seats on a boat voyage from Venice to Padua for my family, with a scheduled departure at 9 AM. My family and I, burdened with luggage from various hotels in Venice, arrived at the dock five minutes behind the designated time. Personally, I had arrived at 8:45 AM, only to be greeted by a rather disconcerting scene. The tour guide was on the brink of departing without us, fostering an atmosphere fraught with stress and tension. Her demeanor lacked friendliness and understanding of our predicament. The confirmation email address was wrong to begin with, the general address took us to a dock that was not accurate on Google or Apple Maps. Moreover, she claimed that the booking email had indicated an arrival time of 8:40 AM. It was only after meticulously sifting through a slew of confirmation emails and scrutinizing an extensive 8-page PDF outlining the trip details that I stumbled upon the 8:40 AM arrival time, while all other correspondence consistently mentioned a 9 AM departure.
The voyage got off on the wrong foot due to this initial unpleasantness. However, it was during the subsequent 8-hour excursion that the boat's captain and the tour guide truly demonstrated their unfriendliness. They continued to treat our group with a palpable lack of courtesy throughout the entire journey. Their behavior included disdainful glances and thinly veiled, passive-aggressive remarks regarding our adherence to the designated boat return times. Additionally, the scorching 97-degree weather exacerbated our discomfort, and the boat's air conditioning proved inadequate. Despite having an 87-year-old member in our party, they denied us the option of closing the boat door to retain some of the precious cool air. Furthermore, my brother, who suffers from a sleep disorder, was not permitted to rest on the boat during the one-hour disembarkation period.
An uncomfortable and unpleasant experience.
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Posted On : 2023-09-04 11:20:43
Posted By : L9262PGsilvial
It was a wonderful experience; we spent a pleasant day accompanied by a very knowledgeable guide who accompanied us in the visit to the Villas and in the description of the route along the river, illustrating the functioning of the various locks and the many swing bridges. A trip I definitely recommend.
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Posted On : 2023-08-12 16:37:53
Posted By : Ange_gian19
We traveled along the Brenta canal with Burchiello, our guide SILVIA was EXCELLENT in her explanations
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Posted On : 2023-08-05 10:58:15
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