Love is in the water

Mathis Winkler

Despite having a splinter stuck in the ring finger of her left hand,

Georgia Mahoney seemed thrilled about the latest catch by her gondoliers.

“We just had four [wedding] proposals in one night,” Mahoney said of

the apparent new record at the Newport Harbor gondola cruise business

that she and her family have owned for several years.

Sitting in her Lido Marina Village office, where Venice’s traditional

transportation vehicle surrounds her in forms ranging from a large

tapestry depicting a gondola scene to a porcelain version that holds her

business cards, Mahoney said couples celebrating golden wedding

anniversaries and 16-year-old love-struck teenagers come to glide around

the bay.

In many ways, she said, Newport Harbor’s waters outshine the canals of

Venice, Italy.

“We have one of the most beautiful bays in the world,” she said.

“Plus, it’s a lot cheaper than going to Venice. And the water is clearer

and it smells better.”

Still, Mahoney is careful to point out that while her gondolas might

be manufactured in the United States, the plans come from the motherland.

She is scheduling to visit the birthplace of gondolas in the near future.

“I have to go pick up [gondoliers’] hats,” she said, laughing. “It’s a

business trip, isn’t it? We have to go soon, perhaps in the fall.”

Although she definitely will go on a gondola cruise around Venice’s

canals, Mahoney said she has heard horror stories about the experience.

“The gondolier was talking on the cell phone the whole time,” she

said.

The options offered by the Mahoney family’s companies, Gondola Romance

and the Gondola Co. of Newport Beach, range from intimate one-hour

cruises to elaborate dinner affairs on larger, tented, electric gondolas.

When it comes to the all-important question of “Will you?” Mahoney has

worked out a regimen of wooing few can resist.

Nervous boyfriends usually fax their love messages to Mahoney before

the big night, she said. The letter then gets stuffed inside a special

love bottle that gondoliers secretly release into the water so the

girlfriends can fish it out.

“One time we had a woman saying, ‘I’m not going to pick up a bottle

from the water,’ ” Mahoney said with a laugh. “And the guy and the

gondolier said, ‘Pick up the bottle!’ ”

Upon return to the dock, Mahoney and the gondoliers -- many of whom

row for local colleges and spend about two months training to navigate

the gondolas -- have devised secret signs to communicate.

“When the gondolier tips his hat to me, it says it’s a ‘yes,’ ”

Mahoney said, adding that she begins ringing a bell to celebrate the new

bride and groom.

“She left the dock his girlfriend, she comes back as his fiance” is

Mahoney’s announcement to dinner guests in nearby restaurants.

So far, only one woman has reversed roles and asked her boyfriend to

marry her, Mahoney said.

The guys, on the other hand, have a pretty good chance of hearing what

they hope to hear.

Out of more than 100 proposals, only one couple returned without an

engagement, Mahoney said.

“It wasn’t exactly a ‘no,’ ” she said. “It was an “I don’t know.’ The

guy was a little premature in his proposal. She told him to ask her again

in six months.”