A French tourist couple's night-time escapade in Venice went badly wrong early on Monday, as police apprehended them after they tried to tour the lagoon city on a stolen gondola.
The couple unmoored a gondola near St Mark's Square but soon got into trouble as the man did not know how to steer it, the ANSA news agency and the local edition of the Corriere della Sera newspaper said.
Rain, wind and strong currents made the task of navigating the Rio San Severo canal even harder, so the gondola crashed its way between the banks and other moored vessels, reports added. 
Police, alerted by a local at around 1 am, came on a motorboat and picked up the 41-year-old man and his 29-year-old female partner, finding them "wet and cold," Corriere said. 
The couple were charged with aggravated theft and illegal possession of a knife, which they used to cut off the gondola's ropes, and is likely to be asked to pay damages to the gondola owner.