Piazzetta San Marco waterfront

The Molo, or waterfront of Piazzetta San Marco, is solid with bobbing gondolas and excursion boats to Murano and beyond. Behind the Zecca and a row of booths offering good prices on plastic light-up gondolas are the Giardinetti Reali, not much as ‘royal’ gardens go, but a rare patch of green (and an even rarer public WC) in the capital of stone and water. Napoleon's step son, Eugène de Beauharnais created it when he knocked down the Fontegheto della Farina, or state granary, to create a view of the lagoon from the Ala Napoleonica. He also added the pretty neoclassical pavilion called the Casino da Caffè (1807), long used as the city tourist information office.