St. George, Utah, United States, Tuesday, October 16, 2012

An early start to a long day. We get up at 0515 and catch the metro right before 0600. Good timing our metro wait is only 1 minute. At Termini station, we walk to the main train station and board the Leonardo Express train that goes direct to the airport. It leaves at 0622 and arrives at the airport at 0655. We have three hours before our flight leaves so we are pretty relaxed. We walk from the train station to the terminal and look for the check in. We leave out of terminal 5 and discover that we have to take a bus there to check in. We find it and then go to get all checked in. Tickets in hand we go through security. Whose pack is this ? They do not like the hiking poles in the packs and say we cannot carry them on. We did not have any problems on the way here and I tell the guy I have a letter saying they are Ok in the packs. He asks me to take one out and takes the letter over to one of his bosses. The letter is from TSA so I am not sure it will help. He returns and it doesn’t matter, we can’t carry on the hiking poles.
Back to check in we go, deciding we will put all the poles in one pack and check it. I ask the girl at the counter if she has a bag I can put the pack in and she leaves to get me one. We put the poles and liquids in my pack, take out anything worth top dollar and put the pack in the plastic bag. Wrap it tight with duct tape, put name on and I go to check it in. That all done, we hope to see it again in Las Vegas. Back through security and Can we check pack? Carol has a corkscrew in her pack and they take it out look at it and give it back so we are set. I am thinking I could hurt someone worse with the metal corkscrew than my aluminum hiking pole but than I am not the expert.
We follow the hall to discover we must now take another bus to the gates at the terminal. One last bus ride in Italy and we walk to our gate glad that we allowed three hours as we are now down to 1 hour and 15 minutes. We have 15 Euros to burn so we check out the airport store and almost buy some melon liquor. Instead, we decide to buy breakfast. Two cannoli’s and one Cappucino for Carol and two tomato and mozzarella sandwiches for later today. That leaves just enough for a bag of chips. We sit at a small table and the cannoli’s are really good. Back at the gate, we wait and they finally start boarding.
I forgot to mention that United in their reservation wisdom, changed our seats sometime between 10 days ago when I looked and yesterday. We are in two separate seats about 15 rows apart. When we checked in, they were only able to move my seat to a row that is one row apart and told us to just ask someone to switch with us. When we get on, I ask the guy next to my seat if he minds switching and he says, I won’t switch this is a better seat. It is in front of the back bulkhead so has a little more legroom but he is quite the jerk none the less. We then ask the guy next to Carol and no problem. Now we are happy, no thanks to United or the guy in 28F who I hope has his foot run over by the food cart.
The flight is a mere 10 hours and no free booze as United gets my vote as the stingiest and greediest major airline out there. We even had to ask for a can of soda as they just give us a cup to start with. I blog a little, watch three movies, and eat the two meals they give us. We touch down a little late but we have still have 3 and a half hours on the layover so we don’t care.
We go through customs and are welcomed back to the good old USA. Then we find out that even if have a connecting flight, you need to pick up your baggage and then re check it. We find my pack and decide to try carrying it on here with the poles. No problem what so ever.
Now we want to call people to say we are here but our phones are not re instated as promised. Hour and a half on the phone with Sprint and we can use the phones. Make a few calls and it is already time to board.
We eat our sandwiches from Rome and after a little more blog work, I try to get some shut eye. Carol is already resting. Landing early in Vegas we now have an hour and a half to wait for our shuttle. Yankees are losing game three to Detroit so looks like I won’t be watching the World Series. Shuttle finally arrives and it is a long two hour drive with periods of unconsciousness taking over. Richard picks us up at the shuttle bus and we get home a little after one AM, St. George time after Over 27 hours of travel. Ugh! And Good Night. I will write a conclusion of our thoughts in a few days when I hopefully will be coherent again. Thanks for reading and hope to see and hear from friends both old and new.
CNC
“Once you have traveled, the voyage never ends. the mind can never break off from the journey”- Pat Conroy

Expenses
3E – metro to Termini
28E – 2 tickets Leonardo Express to Airport

Miles Walked – 1.8 Miles