Los Angeles, a city of freeways and sprawl, where the car rules supreme, and the soundtrack to life is a good Spotify playlist while stuck in traffic on The 405 to drown out the frustrated horns of other cars (or your own). Yet, beyond the rage of the road, there is a quiet little of utopia tucked away in the seaside neighborhood of Venice. It is a quainter pace to life, dictated not by traffic jams, but by the gentle lapping of water against the hulls of kayaks, decked out docks, and the quack of waterfowl (unfortunately also their foul smell). The Venice Canals of Los Angeles are a place where you can slow down and, if only for a moment, wander the walking paths and bridges that connect this car-free canal community, contemplating a unique lifestyle within a unique city.
At the dawn of the 20th century, Abbot Kinney, a wealthy developer with a vision, set out to create a “Venice of America.” He dredged marshland, carved canals, and built arched pedestrian bridges to bring a taste of Italy to the California coast. It reminds me of a similar development of canals of the 1960s in Ocean Shores, Wa. While gondoliers once ferried visitors through Abbot’s waterways, it didn’t last long. By the 1920s, the automobile had taken hold, and the canals were seen as an antiquated relic of a pre-car world.
Yet, part of Abbot’s community survived and thrived. Hidden behind the bustle of Venice Beach, the expensive and exclusive canals community (reminiscent of Seattle’s Houseboat community in terms of unique, and high cost of homes) remains. Today it is a neighborhood of eclectic homes—some modern with sleek glass façades, others impossibly large for such a confined space, and yet others displaying the quirky charm of the unique people who call this place home.
Morning walkers (tourists like us) stroll with coffee in hand, exchanging nods with neighbors as if we belong, while those who do tend their tiny gardens and flower boxes, chatting each other up on the latest neighborhood gossip. Here, amid the chaos of a megacity, the Venice Canals endure as a rare and quiet reflection, and not just in the water.
If you want to see posts about Venice, Italy, check out:
Sabbatikos 
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