Not Quite Ready to Look Back and Laugh

A week in Italy has come and gone. Italy was amazing... Rome, Florence, and Cinque Terre. Of the three I (Cole) most enjoyed Cinque Terre - mostly for its "adventure" aspect. Rome and Florence were tourism overload - though I leave those places feeling more cultured. Our time in Cinque Terre was filled with explorations of the Mediterranean coast. Somewhere around 16km of ground covered trekking through the rocky hills as we made our way through all five of the Cinque Terre (= 5 villages). Our arrival in the final village awarded us with a dip in the cool Mediterranean Sea.

Some thoughts and reflections on Italy:
* To get coffee in Italy, you go to a Bar, where a)you're charged extra if you sit at a table and, b) it's not normal to order coffee with any sort of cream except in the morning (and by coffee, I mean straight expresso).

* Streets in Italy are primarily one-way. Not only this, it's common for them to be one-way in a certain direction and then for a few blocks one-way in the other direction. We experienced this first hand as we rented a scooter for a day in Rome.

* In Italy, dinner is best enjoyed starting at 8:30 or so, and then with at least 4 courses (and a drink to go with each course)

Now, here is a recounting of the "wonderful" happenings of our final hours in Italy. We were driving down from Cinque Terre and pulling into the Rome area (about a 5 hour drive) in search of the hotel we had booked for a few hours of rest before catching an early morning flight to Kenya. Unable to find our hotel, and getting lost in the maze of one-way streets, we stumble across a Sheriden. I pull in to ask the valet for some guidance. He says we are close, hands me a local street map and traces the path that leads to the hotel. As we pull out of the Sheriden and attempt to turn the direction that the valet had drawn for us, on the first street we were looking for, we are hit hard by the wonder of the Italian one-way streets. After about 30 minutes of driving in circles, the tension in the car begins to rise. We're tired. Hungry. Wanting desperately to find our hotel (We should have been there by 6:30, and it is now approaching 9pm). My eyes drift to the gas gauge. Empty. The on board computer tells me 0km until empty. Crap. My mood shifts to frantic as I desperately search for a gas station. I find one. The station is closed except for a self-service machine. The machine takes only European credit cards and bank notes. All I had was 1 and 2 Euro coins. No luck. The frantic search continues - "closed", "closed", "closed". Then at last a station that has MC and Visa logos on its card reader. I insert my card and wait. Nothing happens. I try pumping gas. Nothing. I try pressing the enter button, Nothing. The franticness returns, my Mastercard is still in the machine. "Cancel", "Cancel", "Cancel", "Cancel". Nothing, Nothing, Nothing, Nothing. No hotel. No dinner. No gas. No credit card. Crap. To spare you the rest of the drama, we ended up back at the same blessed Sheriden (not the hotel we had booked), got our hands on some cash, called to put a hold on our now lost credit card, booked ourself a room, found a gas station to fill up with some heavenly fuel, and enjoyed a few short hours of sleep at the Sheriden. Someday it will all be very very funny...


P.S. While walking around Rome, there were a million pigeons flying over our heads one day. About 2 minutes after Tina said "I hate when birds fly overhead! They better not poop on me!"... guess what happened. Poop all over her shoulder! I thought it was hilarious... until about 5 minutes later, I got hit too. It's like they were aiming for us!

P.P.S. We are now safely in Kenya and loving it. More to come about our time here. But Tina was welcomed to the country by getting peed on by a dog.

P.P.P.S. This computer is having trouble uploading photos, so that is all you get for now!