Arrivaderci Roma – or maybe not

 21-22-23 October 2024

 

With travel, things don’t always go according to plan.  Even the most precise planners know that when travelling, things often go awry.  So, travellers learn to be prepared for things going wrong – missed flights, delayed flights, extra nights due to missed connections, whatever.  Preparation and a mindset of “whatever happens, I’ll get home eventually” are the best ways to deal with all those possible extenuating circumstances.

 

Most of our class members left La Romita on 21 October.  We arrived at the airport, and one woman was rather frantic as her flight was leaving in less than an hour.  Hopefully she made it.  Everyone else either had a flight later in the day, or, like me, planned to fly out the following day.  I didn’t really have a choice, all the flights for Tucson left in the morning – so I booked a hotel not too far from the airport, the La Romita bus drove me there, and I had a lovely night.  Turned out that a fellow student, the woman who so kindly gave me a ball of the indigo-dyed yarn she brought with her, was also staying at the same hotel.  We had a very nice dinner right at our hotel, said good-byes, and had a decent night’s sleep.

 

I got up early the next morning (22 Oct), had brekkie at the hotel, and took their shuttle to the airport.  I checked in, and found out my luggage had gained 15 lbs!  Made sense, I had the copper tubing loom as well as five or six jars of black truffle products in there!  It was still under the airline’s maximum, but I was surprised.  (My ticket agent agreed that Spoleto has the best black truffle products in Italy!)

 

Normal airport things – Customs and Immigration, waiting for the flight, boarding the flight.  Then we sat and waited.  The pilot came on the intercom and said the plane had a problem with the hydraulic system, it was being worked on, we should be off soon.  He kept us apprised periodically.  Flight attendants brought drinks, chatted, assured us things would be okay.  Two hours later, our captain came on to say all was fixed, but they needed to re-submit their flight plan or route or something.  This had to go through the Italian office that handles such things, then some European air space office, and the new route then needed to be approved by the US office of the airline.

 

You can see where this is going.

 

Once all those offices approved everything, we then had to wait for a truck to pull the plane away from the jetway.  We FINALLY were cleared to get to a runway – but at this point, the captain told us that we had to wait for our turn to get into the air.  We had exactly 13 minutes for this to happen.  If we were not in the air within 13 minutes, then all the plane’s crew would be over their time working limit before we arrived in the US.  Which meant if we were not in their within those 13 minutes, they’d be forced to cancel the flight.

 

Yes, that’s what happened.  Flight cancelled.  There were several people who were slightly hysterical, they were supposed to go to work the following day.  (I’ve been in that situation, so I can sympathize.  Had to call my principal at home and tell him I was stuck in Florida and would be back to work in two days, please plan for a substitute tomorrow.)

 

People with smartphones began to receive notification of when their new flight was scheduled, and most were on flights the following day.  I whipped out my iPad, signed on, and checked.  Yes, my flight was scheduled to leave 22 Oct, the day I was supposed to arrive.  Looked like a tight connection in Dallas, given that I’d need to collect my luggage, go through Customs/Immigration, and get to the gate.  But this is why I have MagicJack on my iPad, so I planned to call the airline later and push back the connecting flight.

 

Of course, with a huge plane load of people, the airline scrambled to find hotels for all of us.  None of us knew exactly what was happening, but there were a few representatives who told us to get our luggage, and eventually told us to proceed to doorway number something.  (This is why it’s good to travel with luggage you can handle yourself!  I was fine with my rolling duffel and daypack.  Other people were struggling with multiple suitcases each, because there weren’t any carts or skycaps available.)

 

We piled into the bus.  The driver didn’t speak much English, so one of the reps came on and told us we would stay one night at a hotel, there would be a bus tomorrow to drive us back to the airport.  The hotel would provide lunch and dinner. 

 

The bus drove.  And drove.  And drove.  It took probably two hours, given the traffic.  We ended up at a seaside resort in Civitavecchia, the ancient port city outside modern Rome.  (For those wondering, that is pronounced chee-vee-ta-VECK-key-ah.  I know, I’ve practiced so I can say that smoothly.)

 

We lined up, were assigned rooms, received keys.  Given a plastic bag with a panino (one sandwich is a panino, two sandwiches are panini) and a bottle of water.  Told what time dinner would be served.  No one seemed to know what time the buses would arrive the following morning, but it would be early – my flight was leaving at 8 AM.

 

My room was nice, though the floor was still damp as if it had been freshly mopped.  My guess is that this seaside resort had closed for the season, but some airline rep knew or was related to the owner, and they opened up just to house these stranded passengers.

 

So, I enjoyed my lunch on my lovely balcony overlooking the sea – the Tyrrhenian Sea.  I called Richard and told him I was delayed, I had an extra day in Italy.  That I’d get in tomorrow, 23 Oct.  This happens to us all the time, he said fine, not a problem.  We promised to talk later.  I called the airline and pushed back that connecting flight out of Dallas, not a problem.  I took photos of my view of the sea and the marina (it was sunset by now).

 

Dinner was lovely, though all portions were absolutely huge – just one course would have been enough!  Passengers recognized each other, we chatted with people at other tables, it was a room full of stranded travellers either resigned to being delayed, or happy to have an extra day in Italy.  Word spread that our buses would arrive at 4:30 AM, perfect since most of us had an 8 AM flight.

 

Very peaceful night by the sea, my alarm clock woke me in time, I was all set to leave – and I could not get my door unlocked and opened.  I’ve never been good with locks, or keys – people tell me to turn it to the left and I never know if they mean turn the top of the key to the left, or the bottom of the key – they obviously go in opposite directions, and it just never makes sense to me.  I turned the key one way – door stayed locked.  I turned it the other way – locked.  I pulled the door toward me and tried both directions – locked.  Pushed the door forward and tried the key – locked. 

 

The room didn’t have a phone to call the front desk, so I pounded on the door and hollered “Help!  Help!”  No one came.  I went out on the balcony and yelled for a while – no one answered.  I tried the door again, no luck.  More pounding, more yelling, back to the balcony.  Now I was the frantic person, because I needed to get to that bus!

 

On maybe my fifth trip back to the door, I finally got it open.  It was one of those things where the key stops, then you need to really crank it hard to make it unlock the rest of the way.  As I said, I’ve never been good with keys.

 

I was running so late, I rolled my duffel across the dew-covered lawn instead of going around on the paved walkway.  Sorry, but desperate times and desperate measures, all that.

 

Turns out I could have waited.  I got on the bus, and we sat.  And sat.  We were getting worried, it had taken two hours to get here, it was now 5:30 AM, our flight was due to leave a 8:00.  I got out and told the driver, in my minimal Italian, that we needed to go, we fly at eight!  He assured me we’d be fine.

 

I think we finally were on our way just before 6 AM.  We made it to the airport in time for our flight – as we were bused out to the plane, we realized this was exactly the same plane we had been on yesterday!  And we recognized the crew!  Same exact flight with a new time of departure, and new flight number.  Oddly, we all had new seat assignments – you’d think the airline would have kept everyone in their former seats!

 

I was in the same section, had the same sweetheart flight attendant – but because I was several rows back, the meal I had pre-ordered was already taken.  I explained I picked that due to food allergies, the two other options were likely to have foods that I’m severely allergic to – and that I once ended up on a flight getting shots of epinephrine in the plane’s galley!  My wonderful flight attendant went to the captain and asked if he’d be okay with a different main course for his meal, so I was able to have my chicken rather than the pilaf (with cashew) or the meat (with chutney, all too often mango).  Many thanks to the captain and flight attendant!

 

The rest of the trip was fine, though I’m glad I bumped back the flight to Tucson.  I kept Richard apprised of my travels, and by the time I arrived in Arizona, he was tired, it was dark, I said I’d grab a taxi and he should stay home.  I had a friendly taxi driver, made it home safe and sound, after taking what became the loooooong way home.

 

So – two maps of Italy.  The close up is obviously the outlined square on the first map.  The pink star is La Romita in Terni.  The pink circles are the towns we visited, and the numbers show in what sequence.  "D" is for delay, LOL!