By Anna Porto
Anna Porto is an Italian teacher at West Haven High School, Connecticut, for the last 13 years. She is a mom of a brave traveler, Stella. Since Stella was little, they travelled to Europe almost every summer to collect memories and enjoy new adventures.
I took my then 11-year old daughter to Italy for the very first time in June 2022. We took a ferry from Croatia and after a couple of hours we arrived in the scorching port of Venice. Traveling with kids has many benefits, but also many challenges. Would I recommend to others to take their young kids to travel across Europe? Absolutely!
When you ask Stella today about her memories from Venice, she always mentions that those three days were the hottest days on planet Earth. If you ask again, she starts remembering the fish market we stumbled upon, the many bridges we crossed and all different kinds of gelato we tried. Then she remembers the boats, the water, the canals and with an all knowing smile tells her friends that “Gondolas are a tourist trap. You should try to get on a vaporetto! ” She recommends, but she fails to mention that the hot Venetian summer caused her a mini heat stroke and we spend one whole day cooling off in the hotel room. She also doesn’t mention that the vaporetto ride lasted only one stop because she panicked and claimed she got seasick…
Then, with the expertise of a preteen she points to her Venetian glass bracelet: “The glass the Venetians made was more precious than gold? And did you know that you cannot feed the pigeons in Piazza San Marco? And also the coffee shops are called Bars? We found Bar Stellina, I swear.”
The hottest days of Stella’s life were filled with memories that she would not make in her comfy AC home in Connecticut. And the best part for me is just listening to her travel stories that she presents with fierce bravery to anybody willing to ask: “How did you like Venice, Stella?”
