With February just around the corner, people are starting to talk about the Venice Carnival 2012.
Commencing on 4th February with a grand toast at the wine fountain in Piazzetta San Marco, the celebrations really get into full swing from the 11th - 21st, with parades, dance lessons, dinners and of course, the famous masked balls.
One of the highlights this year, according to venice-carnival-italy.com, is a tour that follows in the footsteps of famous Venetian, Giacomo Casanova.
Starting at La Fenice opera house, visitors are treated to a history of the Carnival and the significance of the elaborate costumes before winding through the narrow paths to the legendary lothario's favourite spots.
This includes tales of the Ridotto, Venice's first casino and "easy meeting place" for Casanova and the aristocracy but which was closed down under efforts to preserve Venetian decorum, plus the Doge's Palace, where he was locked up in 1755. This building later becomes the magical location for the fantastic Il Ballo de Doges masked ball.
Writing for The Independent, journalist Nick Boulos took a Casanova tour, discovering that as a young man he trained to be a priest and that a visit to a witch doctor "sparked a lifelong fascination in medicine, alchemy and black magic."
It would prove useful in his later 'career'; apparently he 'cured' frequent cases of syphilis by self-administering mercury.
The tour also explored other locations important to Casanova, such as the Do Spade tavern and his birthplace in Calle Malipiero. Visitors will find that there was much more to the man than simply his romantic reputation but will notice that, during the carnival in particular, his "legend lives on".