If great art is your main dish, you'll want an aesthetically pleasing hotel, and you'll need regular palate-cleansing between Titians. We recommend the best.

Before embarking on the Titian tour of Venice, be aware that opening hours differ for the various churches and museums; check with your hotel's concierge. Many of the city's museums can be visited on the $12 Biglietto Cumulativo. A foundation for the churches of Venice, Chorus sells a $10 pass, available in the major churches. Individual admission fees are about $3.

The country and city code for Venice is 39-041. Room rates quoted are for the current month. The nearest U.S. consulate is at 2/10 Via Principe Amedeo, in Milan (02-290-351; usembassy.it/milan).

Lodging
Art historians still like La Calcina, favored by John Ruskin, the Victorian art critic, who stayed here in the mid 19th century when he was working on The Stones of Venice. With only 29 rooms, some with views of the island of Giudecca, it books up quickly in summer (520-64-66; lacalcina.com; doubles, $178-$215; v; w). Fortunately, several new hotels have opened in the area, which is near the Accademia yet far from the mass tourism of San Marco. Ca' Pisani is a stylish, upscale newcomer (240-1411; capisanihotel.it; doubles, $276-$390; w). A few steps away from the Pisani and the Accademia, the Hotel Belle Arti is an attractively recycled former hostel with a garden and a fountain (522-6230; hotelbellearti.com; doubles, $171-$242; w). The Hotel Galleria is atmospherically set in part of a 17th-century palace on the Grand Canal (523-2489; hotelgalleria.it; doubles, $109-$171; w). Locanda Ca' del Brocchi is seven small rooms in a 16th-century palazzo near the Guggenheim (522-6989; cadelbrocchi.it; doubles, $148; w). The Hotel alla Salute da Cici is an inexpensive alternative (523-5404; hotelsalute.com; doubles, $83-$160; v; w).

Because I didn't arrange to arrive by boat at the useful dock in the back, it took me a while to find the secluded new Boscolo Grand Hotel dei Dogi, in the residential area of Madonna dell' Orto, near the Gesuiti church. The plush hotel has 70 rooms, a spacious interior garden, and views of the lagoon (220-8111; deidogi.boscolohotels.com; doubles, $270-$490; w).

Dining
An 18th-century scuola now houses the Ristorante Riviera, which is in a wonderful location right on the Zattere, the Venetian side of the Giudecca Canal, virtually across from Harry's Dolci and the Stucky flour mill (whose lethargic recycling into apartments and a hotel has been even slower than the rebuilding of the Venice opera theater). Eaters were recently entertained by a sudden burst of fire that demolished part of the project, so the epic will go on a bit longer. Very fresh seafood, cooked in more adventurous ways than in many Venetian restaurants: a carpaccio of octopus, a trittico di pesci crudi (raw fish), and homemade black pasta (made with cuttlefish ink) with frutti di mare (522-7621; entrées, $12-$25).

On the Giudecca itself, facing the lagoon, Mistrà is part of a new and lively marina complex, the Venice Plaza, in a much less well-known corner of Venice. The restaurant, on the top floor of an old industrial building, looks out to sea through large windows. It caters to locals, some of whom arrive in small boats to sample the owner's grilled rombo (turbot), among other fish specialties (522-0743; entrées, $12-$32).

Antica Trattoria La Furatola derives its name from the Venetian word meaning a small shop selling prepared food at a good price. Its two cheerful rooms are often filled with locals, who come here for the two types of seafood antipasti—marinated (sarde in saor, anchovies, etc.) and boiled (shrimp, cicale di mare, etc.). The catch of the day is cooked to your order (520-8594; entrées, $12-$23).

Part of a small, pleasant hotel, Osteria di Santa Marina is on a very quiet and atmospheric campo near San Lio in Castello (523-5239; entrées, $14-$30). The American guy in the crisp blue shirt might be John Berendt, the author of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, who likes to eat here or at Agli Alboretti while he finishes his new Venice-set novel (523-0058; entrées, $14-$25).

Reading
The scholarly visitor will not want to be without Giulio Lorenzetti's beautifully written Venice and Its Lagoon, first published in 1926 and revised most recently in 1999 (Lint, $34). For art enthusiasts, Titian—the catalog for the exhibition that was at the National Gallery in London and at Madrid's Prado in 2003—is quite helpful (National Gallery, $33). The Accademia Galleries in Venice, published by the Soprintendenza per i Beni Artistici e Storici di Venezia, is also indispensable ($23). Stefano Zuffi's Art in Venice catalogs extraordinary cultural souvenirs of the city, century by century (Abradale Press, $40).

In Myths of Venice: The Figuration of a State, Columbia art history professor David Rosand describes how the city's elite propaganda-meisters deployed artists and architects to refine their concept of Venice as "the most serene republic" (University of North Carolina Press, $40). Likewise, John Julius Norwich's A History of Venice is very engaging. The wry Lord Norwich has an eye for the remarkable and often truly weird people who created a magical town out of mudflats and reeds (Vintage, $25). Venice: The Biography of a City, by Christopher Hibbert, is a smart, splendidly illustrated volume by the prolific English historian (Grafton, $45).

And for the gastronomically inclined, Gudrun Kosmus and Johanna Oberhollenzer have written Venice Outdoors. These two well-informed locals set out to eat their way through Venice and now share their favorites (GJ, $14).

v = Good value for the destination
g = Gold List 2003
w = Handicapped-friendly