Burano

Burano is a small, brightly painted fishing island in the Venetian Lagoon, about 7 kilometers northeast of Venice and a roughly 45-minute vaporetto ride from St. Mark's Square. Its houses -- rows of saturated blues, reds, yellows, and greens along narrow canals -- make it one of the most photographed corners of the lagoon, but the island's older claim to fame is a tradition of handmade lace so fine it once dressed European royalty.

Burano is a small, still-inhabited fishing community, not a stage set -- the brightly painted houses are people's homes, and its narrow streets were not built for the volume of visitors that arrives on a typical afternoon. Keeping to public areas, being mindful of noise near residential doorways, and buying lace directly from island workshops rather than resellers helps support the community whose presence gives the island its character in the first place.

Burano has no bridge to the mainland -- the only way to reach it is by vaporetto (water bus) from Venice, a journey of about 45 minutes from St. Mark's Square, usually with a change at Fondamente Nove or Murano. The island is compact and entirely walkable, with its brightly colored houses radiating out from Piazza Baldassare Galuppi, its only square.

Burano draws heavy day-trip crowds from late morning through mid-afternoon, often on the same itinerary as a stop in Murano. Visiting early in the morning or in the last couple of hours before the final vaporetto back to Venice gives a much quieter view of the canals and houses, closer to how the island actually looks to the people who live there.