Holy Moments: A Stroll Through Venice
In our seventies, Sherri and I still feel deeply blessed to travel. We don’t fly first-class. We shop for deals and off-season prices. We travel cheap! What matters most to us is freedom - independent travel, the kind that lets us wander without schedules, avoid crowds, and move at our own pace. We’ve learned that successful days aren’t about ticking off landmarks, but about conversations, shared meals, and moments where we almost disappear into the rhythm of a place.
This trip to Venice was different this time. No kids. No grandkids. No teams to lead or big agendas. Just the two of us, returning to a city we’d seen before—but this time, with a new mindset. We didn’t want the must-sees. We wanted something slower, deeper. A backdoor adventure. We rode water taxis through quiet canals. We wandered alleys and footpaths - walking (we think) over half of Venice’s 104 footbridges. There was no rush. No guidebooks. Just curiosity.
One of the trip’s biggest highlights came from a simple risk I took—a hopeful, out-of-nowhere email. Early in my life, I worked at a boatyard in Maryland, repairing and painting yachts along the Chesapeake Bay. So this time in Venice, I reached out to the city’s most well-known gondola builder and asked if we could visit. To my surprise, the owner’s daughter replied: Yes. And so she welcomed us into the workshop and spent the afternoon sharing the deep history, precision craftsmanship, and strict traditions behind Venice’s most iconic boats. For me, it wasn’t just a tour - it was personal. Tourism became education. Adventure became meaning.
We then skipped the echoing cathedrals and instead joined a personal guide who took us through the city’s smallest, most hidden sanctuaries - the kind most people stroll past without noticing. Quiet spaces. Stillness. Sacred in their simplicity. I lit candles in remembrance of my mother and Nana. And then, of course, came the food—and the people.
Down a side alley, we found a little lunch spot where everyone knew each other’s names - except ours. But by the second day, we felt like part of the furniture. A few doors down from our hotel, we slipped into a tiny bar-restaurant: four tables, eight bar stools, and a nightly circle of locals trading stories over wine. It wasn’t epic. It wasn’t Instagram-worthy. It was exactly what we hoped for.
On our final evening, something unforgettable happened. The owner of that little restaurant—the same man who’d served us each night—tore off one of the paper placemats, wrote reserved across it, and laid it gently on our usual table. We’re almost certain they’d never done that for anyone else. Then, as we paid the bill, he pulled me aside, shook my hand, and pressed something into it: a small, empty, six-ounce Italian beer mug. This, he said with a smile, is the best souvenir you’ll ever take home. And he was right.