The Venice tour for kids you'll love: Venice Walks and Tours review

Venice tour for kids recommendation. Our review of the kid-friendly Venice Tour by Venice Walks and Tours: what to expect, which one to choose, why you’ll love it.

I love visiting Venice with the kids.

No matter how many times we go, I never tire of the sparkle in their eyes when they see Venice’s wonderful canals, their excitement of exploring the city’s labyrinthine alleys and that sense of being enveloped in magic only a city as unique as Venice can evoke.

All it takes to admire the beauty of Venice is to step out of the train station and see the Gran Canal shimmering in front of your eyes.

However, it is almost impossible to go a little deeper and tap into the history and marvels of a city like Venice without a guide!

Venice has an incredible history and it is full of anecdotes, episodes, legends and secrets you will not uncover unless you are with a local.

This is why I highly recommend you get a guide if visiting Venice with kids and trust them to show you the city.

I happen to have the perfect kid-friendly guide for you!

Her name is Lucia, she is a Venice local, a very competent guide and founder ‘Venice Walks and Tours’.

She is lovely with children and has developed scavenger hunt tours for them that is fun, informative and an all-around great experience.

I took her family tour of Venice with my ten-year-old last week and we loved both the tour and Lucia herself.

If you follow me on Instagram, you may already have seen some photos from it.

Today, I share all the details so you can book it too!

My daughter in Venice Italy taking a photo of a statue of a lion

Why take a kids’ tour of Venice

I highly recommend you start your visit to Venice with a tour that is specifically for children and find your feet with a specialized family-friendly guide.

The main reasons for this recommendation are:

A kid-friendly guide will make the fascinating and complex history of Venice manageable and captivating for little ones

A Venice tour for kids with a game-centered approach will keep kids entertained during the inevitable walking you will be doing in Venice. They will be so taken by the scavenger hunt, they won’t notice the distance covered!

You and the children will discover fund and charming corners and stories of Venice you would never be able to uncover on your own

The maze-like streets of Venice are a lot less daunting if explored with a local guide

Why take a family tour of Venice with Venice Walks and Tours

We had an excellent experience with Lucia of Venice Walks and Talks and highly recommend her.

In Lucia, we found:

A lovely, kind and patient lady, who made my even shy daughter feel welcome and special

A competent guide able to share info interesting for kids but also adults, in such a way to keep all ages entertained

A tour that has a fun approach that made learning feel like a game. Lucia is the kind of guide who’ll make you jump in a Venetian Palace to show you how the engineering of a city on water works!

A well-thought-out Venice tour for kids with a scavenger hunt that kept my daughter entertained during the tour and the following days, thanks to Lucia’s prompt and cues.

A very responsive, professional and attentive guide that made all the steps of our booking, from the first email to the end of the tour and beyond, a breeze

Local square in Dorsoduro neighborhood in Venice

What Venice tour for kids to choose

Lucia offers several Venice tours for families, ranging from a scavenger hunt tour of the Doges’ Palace to several walking tours with possible add-ons such as mask-making or gelato stop.

You can find the full list of what she has on offer on her website.

Her tours all have the fun scavenger hunt approach kids love but they cover different areas and suit slightly different interests.

For instance (in brackets, my recommendations):

Venice Highlights tour for families (recommend for first-time visits): if this is your first time in Venice and want to make sure you don’t miss the must-see, this is a great tour that will show you and the kids famous Rialto Bridge, the Gran Canal and stunning St Marks’ Square

Doge’s Palace and San Mark’s Square Tour (recommended for first-time visits): If you only have a short time in Venice and want to visit the highlights and the inside of the world-famous Doges’ Palace, this tour is for you.

The Palace is one of the main landmarks in Venice and a visit here will lead you to the heart of the historical Venitian power and lead you to the very center of the city, St Mark’s square. Duration: 2.5h.

Hidden Venice for kids, scavenger hunt in Dorsoduro (our top pick!): if you have already been to Venice or if this is your first time but want to see more local, less touristy part of Venice, this is the tour for you (this is also the one we did this time!).

This is an absolutely fabulous Venice tour for kids that shows you a lovely Venetian neighborhood and a ‘squero’, the place where they have been building and repairing gondolas for centuries!

Squero in Venice, the workshop where they build and repair gondolas

Venice kids’ tour with mask workshop (recommended for crafty kids): if have kids who love making, like I do, this is a fantastic tour that mixes exploring Venice with a workshop with a real artisan to make their very own carnival mask!

Family tour of Castello and Cannaregio (perfect for returning visitors or visitors interested in lesser beaten areas): this is the perfect tour to discover two of the most fascinating and often overlooked areas of Venice, Cannaregio (where you also find Venice’s Jewish Ghetto) and Castello, one of the most kid-friendly areas in the city, graces also by a wonderful, large park with playground.

Tailor-made Venice tour for families: if you can’t decide which tour from the above is best, or fancy several items that appear in different ones, just ask Lucia for a tailor-made tour and she’ll work with you to make it happen.

Scavenger hunt tour of Venice with kids with Lucia – our review

For our latest trip to Venice with my daughter, I chose to book Lucia for her Dorsoduro treasure hunt tour.

I choose this one for a couple of reasons. The first is that our hotel was in Dorsoduro and I was attracted by the idea of something local.

Since I only had three days in Venice with my 10-year-old, I wanted to minimize the time spent moving around and this tour started from around the corner from us: too tempting to miss!

The other reason is that while the area around St Mark’s square is wonderful, we had already seen it many times and felt we could do with a different type of adventure, one that felt more local.

We felt this would give us new insight into Venice and it would also give us a chance to see less crowded areas, which indeed was the case!

We met Lucia in front of the Accademia Gallery (we didn’t go in, this time).

Lucia met us outside and after the introduction, she gave my daughter a booklet with things to find and a table where to keep score of what she found.

The booklet was immediately a hit with her: simple things like getting to choose the color of the felt pen or being in charge of her booklet made her feel involved and busy and she is the type of child who loves a task, so we were off to a great start!

The tour had a great pace: with the prompt of things to spot on the way, we covered a distance that was not so big to make us tired but long enough to offer several views of Venice and show us several aspects of the city.

Along the way, we spotted masks, lions, magical clocks, witches, secret gardens, tower bells, and we even discovered where to get real Venetian Gelato (no, it is not the one you think!).

We saw mask shops, gondolas, were introduced to ‘the nicest gondolier in Venice’ and even saw a squero, the incredible place where gondolas are made and repaired!

We had an absolutely fabulous time.

As well as telling us stories of Venice, Lucia had a great way of telling us little secrets about the city that we were able to recall also in the following days and made us feel like we knew something others were oblivious to (ask her about street numbers and neighborhood acronyms).

By the end of the tour, we found ourselves back where we started, so there was no extra walking to be done and we both felt entertained and satisfied.

The prize at the end was a lovely touch and it kept giving the following day too!

We had a lovely tour, so we recommend Lucia to all families looking for a kid-friendly tour of Venice.

What age is this kids’ tour of Venice for

I believe this tour is perfect for kids aged 6 to 11, possibly a little younger depending on the child.

If you have a toddler, I would instead suggest you book a tour with Lucia for adults, but specifying that you have a little one, so that she can adapt the pace of the experience accordingly.

How to book a Venice tour for kids with Lucia

The best way to book a tour with Lucia is by email or via her website.

By filling out the contact form, you can enquire about the tour you want: I would be grateful if you could let her know you found her via me (Marta from Mama Loves Italy) as I’d love for her to know I recommend her.

What to bring on this scavenger hunt in Venice for kids

The main thing you need on this Venice tour for kids is good walking shoes.

If you have a stroller, also a bit of patience will be necessary as many of the bridges of Venice have steps and you’ll have to lift the stroller.

You don’t really need anything else special as Lucia has all your kids’ needs to enjoy the tour; so, whatever you have on you while out and about will suffice.

I hope this review of Lucias’ tours is helpful and it convinced you to book a Venice tour for kids with her. Safe family travels to Venice!