Venice

Stay the night - the city is different before 7am

Venice is the city that should not exist and does anyway, and the improbability is the point. Built on wooden piles in a lagoon in the fifth century, it has been sinking slowly ever since and showing no signs of giving up.

I stayed one night in Cannaregio, far from San Marco, where the neighbourhood is still primarily Venetian. In the mornings before the day boats arrived, the city was completely quiet - just water and stone and pigeons.