Streetwise in Venice

Look at an Italian street map and the terms used to describe roads, streets, and plazas usually include via, viale, corso, and piazza. But Venice, the city of more than a hundred islands criss-crossed by canals and bridges, has several unique names to describe walkways, roads, streets, and passageways that might not be familiar.

A calle is a narrow lane, while a campo is a square and a campiello is a small square. Then there's a fondamenta, which parallels a canal or lagoon, and a molo, which is a pier or wharf. Finally, if you're looking to take a gondola ride, it will take place on a rio, or canal - not a rio terrà, which is a filled-in canal.