The Adventure Winding Down

Today started early, about 5:30, as Concetta and I made ready to tackle the last leg of our Greek/Italian adventure. We tried to get into the breakfast room just when it opened because our hotel, the Villa Maria, is playing host to a couple of busloads of Brits who've proven to be a tad noisy when cooped up together in a small space.

Though the food is certainly nothing to brag about at the Villa Maria, the hotel is clean and the staff friendly. It turned out that the extra nice room they gave us when we arrived late was a tad expensive, but not quite as bad as I expected. We did enjoy having the nice patio attached to our room.

Sorrento is a tough place to move around because there's only one road in and out. With all the Italian guys and girls on their motor scooters, the tour buses, delivery trucks, zippy little Fiats, and pedestrians stepping into the street from all directions definitely slowed us down a bit. Probably best to arrive or leave on a Sunday as yesterday the streets were much less crowded.

Our little GPS decided to have a go at us one more time as we wended our way toward Napoli where we would catch the A3 to Rome. Once again, though the sign said go left for Napoli the GPS said go right for another chance to get completely lost amid the ancient neighborhoods surrounding the docks. This time, though, we ignored the little prankster and relied on our intuition to head us north.

The next bit of fun we encountered was the chance to be marooned inside a very long tunnel as some sort of crash up ahead brought traffic to a standstill. Neither of us is very comfortable being in tunnels, especially since on our last visit to Italy we were blocked in a tunnel that quickly began to fill with smoke. At that time we had visions of having to abandon the car and sprint for the end of the tunnel we'd just entered. Thankfully, just as the smoke began to look threatening, the traffic suddenly began to lurch forward and we were soon out in the fresh air. We never did find out what caused either the hold up or the smoke. This time, thankfully, we had relatively fresh air -- not counting the contributions from Diesel trucks and buses -- and after a half hour we got rolling again.

Once we reached the A3, we really started to pick up speed. In the past the maximum speed I felt comfortable traveling on the Auto Strada was 140 KPH. Even at that speed the German cars sailed by me in the left lane like I was peddling a bicycle. Today, since the road was so smooth and the traffic so light, I cranked the big Passat up to 160 KPH and we got to Rome in super quick time.

Our first mission once we got to the Rome airport was to find the Airport Hilton where we would be staying. I wanted to check in and take the bags to the room before we returned the rental car. All this worked exactly as planned. The check-in went very smoothly. We made contact with the porter who would drive us to the airport tomorrow morning and we were in our room by just after lunch time. Our next task was to return the car, which always makes me nervous. But this time, with our Avis car, the clipboard guy briefly looked the car over, had me sign a credit card slip, and told me I could leave. I've never seen anything so easy.

Our next task was to go to the Continental ticket desk and check on our seat assignments, a job which should have been dead easy. Au contrar! Because U.S. carriers demand a higher level of security in check-in, they now have their own terminal. For awhile we tried to walk there, occasionally asking non-English speaking passersby where terminal five might be. Finally, a flight attendant, in her pretty broken English, let us know that we had to ride a shuttle bus there. Since the shuttle bus stopped just scant feet from where we were standing, that turned out to be easy. But when we arrived at terminal five, things didn't exactly look right. I tried asking the shuttle driver if he would be back to pick us up, but he just shrugged.

Here things got even more interesting. When we went into the terminal, we found not a soul working there. We looked at each other. The scene reminded me of those sole-survivor films where everyone in the city is dead and only one person is left to wander the deserted streets. Now and again a janitor or similar workman would appear and disappear just to show us not everyone was dead, but for the most part the terminal remained empty. Right about then an elderly couple appeared and informed us that the terminal was closed for the day and no one would be back until the next morning. They, as it turned out, had bought a $50.00 cab ride to the airport to change their flight only to find the terminal closed for the day. Their only choice was to go back to their Rome Hotel -- another $50.00 cab ride -- and come back the next morning. We felt really sorry for them.

Soon after we four gathered in the parking lot and tried to interest someone in our plight. We really didn't know if anyone would be back for us. Why would a shuttle bus come to a closed terminal? The elderly couple tried to use the "wheelchair ordering" intercom to the main terminal to get information, but the person at the other end kept wanting to know if they needed a wheelchair. The conversation would have been pretty amusing if it hadn't been so tragic. Finally, the elderly couple wore the intercom person down and she told them that the shuttle would indeed come back for us.

As it turned out, once Concetta and I were back in the room we easily pulled up our Continental reservation and seat assignments on the PC (finally our last night in Italy we have in-room Internet access) and all looked in order, which I could have accomplished in the first place. But I wanted to have a real person in front of me just in case I had to argue for a certain seat setup that the computer refused to give me.

So, here we are, just chilling out at the Airport Hilton and taking it easy. We are both genuinely sorry that our adventure is over AND very thankful that we will be back in our boring old existence for awhile. At least we won't have to be incessantly looking for the universal "WC" wherever we go. So, I hope you've enjoyed hearing about some of what we've experienced. I apologize for the lack of photos this time. I was very disappointed to learn that the Aegean Odyssey had locked out the passenger's picture uploading ability. In the future, I will have to be even more vigilant in ferreting out suitable hosts for our traveling pants. For now, I bid you the Italian "do-all" greeting, Ciao, and buona fortuna in your traveling future.