sylvia’s travels

We’re all packed up and ready to go, only to load the car. Plan on leaving around 9 am for the airport in Pisa as our flight leaves 1 pm – allows us 2 hours to get there even though it is only 50 miles plus we’ll be there 2 hours ahead of time.

Around 4 am we are wakened by thunder, lightening and sleet pounding on our window. When we wake up the storm is over and the sky is pretty clear so we breathe a sigh of relief. Down to Principessa drive, turn right and not but a quarter mile later the road is blocked by a police car and it looks like they are working on a transformer or something; about a dozen cars lined up. Turn the car around, head back to Cavalagerri to see if there is another way to get to the freeway. Remember in San Vincenzo only one way to get under the railroad tracks in order to get to the freeway.

Oh yes she says about 4 km down the road take a left and that will lead us to the freeway. About 3-4 miles through wooded area I see the freeway and the overpass leading to it – yippee – only trouble is there are two police cars blocking the overpass. I signal to one of the offiicers, tell him we need to get to the airport in Pisa. Does he speak english? Noooo! He just says San Vincenzo, San Vincenzo. I try to tell him it is blocked but he no comprende. Several cars are turning around and following a road going north so figuring they might be locals and know what they’re about we follow them for about 5 miles. Sure enough an entrance to the freeway going north. This has taken us about 45 minutes – so much for our extra hour leeway.

Maggie delivers us to the car rental drop off, check in our car and haul our luggage over to a long line where we board a shuttle for the departure gate. Bedlam, the departure gates have one general line with a couple of hundred people in it and we have no idea where to check in. Thank goodness for the many english travelers, they knew exactly what to do and directed us to Lufthansa where there were only 3 people in front of us – we get checked in pretty quickly. Now we have plenty of time to relax, get something to eat or drink and wait for our flight. Except there is no place to sit and the only food is where you line up, get your stuff and stand up to eat it. Not good.

Since Rod has his cane we are able to board the bus and plane first – wow is that an advantage and we are met at the other end with a wheelchair. Our flight over the alps is beautiful and I am able to get a ton of pictures of them as well as the terrain since this plane flies so low – cool. The terminal is huge in Munich, a really long walk – at least 1 1/2 to 2 miles, but we just buzz right on thru, even customs, and we have a good hour to spend at our gate before take off. Here is a lovely restaurant so we order a panini (delicious) and wine and beer and people watch. Always fun to do.

Great trip, great adventures, sometimes scary, sometimes stressful. We sure saw a lot that we never would have seen on a tour – so we were very glad we did it this way.