On a budget, San Giorgio Maggiore still earns its price.
Church free; campanile lift ~€8
A two-minute vaporetto across the basin reaches Palladio's serene white island church, which holds two huge Tintorettos and — the real prize — a lift up its campanile for the postcard view back across the water to the Piazza and Doge's Palace. The catch: it's an extra hop most day-trippers skip (which is the point), and the church interior is austere compared with the city's gilded ones.