Up, Up, and Away

The flights were fine. I had a complimentary upgrade from DC to Rome, and there was no one in the seat beside me, so I had a reasonable amount of space. Funny enough, the flight from DC flew right back up over Boston, so I might as well not have spent that three hours in the air. Next time, I’ll book a direct flight from Rome, even if it has to be Alitalia.

The only thing that went awry on the crossing was the guy in front of me spilled a glass of champagne before we even took off. Of course, it landed right on top of my laptop case which had been stowed in front of me but under his seat. It could have been worse; it could have been his after shave!

No problems at arrival in Rome. It was really nice seeing the sun rising just over the horizon of the Mediterranean Ocean as we landed.  The sunshine didn’t last long, but more about that later.

Clearing customs couldn’t have been easier. Maybe it helped that I just had a carry-on. BTW, final weight of the backpack, on the scale at the bus station in Portland: 17 lbs.

The Leonardo Express ran on time and I met two Canadians, a father and son from Toronto, on route to a relative’s villa in Sicily. They’d been on the plane from DC, but had flown first from TO and still had an eight hour train trip ahead of them. A couple of American priests (I could tell by the garb) were on heading to the Vatican. Like most city trains, the route passed scenery that wasn’t the best. It could have been the last half hour into Penn Station.

But it wasn’t   :-)