Back to the States...but wait! There's more...travel delays

Just when you think a 2+ hour layover is enough…poof.

Of course, we did not leave at 11:15, and did not get into Atlanta at 4:30.

We scrambled from our gate to customs, which was handling probably 3 planeloads of passengers as efficiently as possible. Once we cleared customs, we were directed to security - where Bob’s bag got pulled.

For the corkscrew he forgot he had packed.

In his defense, we are the only country that considers a corkscrew a deadly weapon. In Italy, at least (and probably France), traveling with a corkscrew is like traveling with a toothbrush. We bought the corkscrew in Palermo - none of the airport security screenings to this point had been bothered about it.

But Atlanta was. They pulled absolutely everything out his carry-on, looking for this cheap corkscrew that could barely handle opening a bottle of wine whenever we had occasion to use it. They sent the bag back through the scanner, contents all piled up this way and that. Rummaged around some more. Finally Bob told them to check inside a pair of shoes, and there it was.

Bob repacked his bag, and had given up any hope that we would make the flight - we had to get the train from terminal F to terminal A. I hurried him along, because God knows, we hadn’t had a single flight on the entire trip that actually left on time.

And sure enough, the gate was still open. We were hurried onto the plane, the last two passengers.

Home felt pretty good that night.

Fiumicino Hotel and Restaurants

Possibly an underrated place to stay near the Rome airport, very convenient for positioning the night before any flights. We stayed at the Hotel Tiber twice (arriving and departing Rome) (https://www.hoteltiberfiumicino.it/), right on the river. Rooms are a tad dated (no USB ports) and worn but perfectly fine. Good breakfast if you choose to pay for it (not too many breakfast options nearby). The hotel shuttle is cheap at 6 euro, if the schedule works for you; otherwise, fixed rate taxi for 25 euro is very easy (do NOT stand in the taxi line after baggage claim - ask where the “local” taxi stand is).

Beer Wave (https://www.facebook.com/beerwavecraft/). Tiny brewery located around the corner from Hotel Tiber in Fiumicino. Limited food menu, which we did not try, but microbrew-loving hubby thought the ales were very good. I had an Aperol Spritz made with lambic (that’s an “L”, it’s not the poetic meter lol, it’s a Belgian wild yeast ale) and it was the best Aperol Spritz I have ever had.

Tarumbo, Via della Torre Clementina, 206, 00054 Fiumicino RM, Italy. No website, but Yelp and Trip Advisor have reviews - although I can’t seem to find a complete menu anywhere. Lovely dinner, with meat and fish options as well as pasta, pizza and a variety of focaccia. Nice wine selection, includes half bottles. Indoor and outdoor seating areas.  $66 for  pasta, grilled fish, salad, focaccia, half bottle of wine.

Follis, Via della Torre Clementina, 146, 00054 Fiumicino RM, Italy. Website has no info. https://www.facebook.com/FollisRistorante/. This is a real wow. Not sure why it is listed as an “American Bar” - nothing American about it as far as I can tell. This is NOT a pizza place. Beautiful bar area, plenty of indoor seating including an enclosed patio. Wine “list” was a book that weighed a few pounds. We had fried anchovies as an app, with a lemon gel. Pasta w prawns and peas had 2 sauces - delicious. Pasta with mussels and asparagus was also fantastic. Beautiful food presentation. And cheap - $75 for starter, 2 pastas, and a bottle of wine.

MecFish, Via della Torre Clementina, 222, 00054 Fiumicino RM, Italy. https://mecfish.it/menu-online/ Really good “fast food” - great fried fish options, arancini, but also burgers, etc.

More Transportation Ridiculousness

Instead of taking 3 trains to get to the airport in Rome - where we would stay overnight in a nearby hotel before our flight the next morning - we opted for the Sorrento-Naples airport shuttle and then a short flight to Rome. Easy, right?

The bus idea was a great one. Ten euro, and hour-and-fifteen-minutes to Naples airport. We would arrive almost too early for our flight, but the other option was to cut it a little close, so opted for the earlier departure. And thank god we did.

The hour-and-fifteen turned into…3 hours. Traffic, construction, and traffic…on small winding roads through all the little towns along the way north. I think it took over an hour just to get out of the greater Sorrento area. Unlike many of our fellow passengers, we ended up arriving in plenty of time for our flight, only to walk into the airport, check the departure board, and there it is - CANCELLED.

We approached the check-in desk and were told the flight was indeed cancelled, no explanation. Our passports were checked, names scribbled on a yellow legal pad (!) along with the growing list of other passengers. There would be…a bus.

• Us: OK, what time and where?

• Agent: (waves hand toward front doors, where 8 buses are parked or moving) 3:45, in front.

• Us: Where in front?

• Agent: (waves hand again) Out there. You are on the list.

Armed with this helpful bit of detailed info, we proceeded to look for the bathroom (signs directed you to an elevator - took us a while to realize that the only bathrooms were in the basement), get some coffee and bite to eat, all in a small regional airport that, like Palermo, did not have enough seating.

At about 3, we checked in with the agent again, who again waved us to the front doors. Passengers were starting to gather, where another agent - list rolled up in his hand - stood by the front doors offering absolutely no information or instructions to anyone. 3:45 pm came and went, and at about 4:30, the crowd was finally directed outside where we had to load our luggage in the hold of a bus and line up to board.

And they did not have enough seats on the bus. We were the very last two passengers to board, anyone behind us had to fetch their luggage and - I guess? - wait for another bus.

Two-and-a half hours later, we arrive at the Rome airport. Half the bus had missed connections. We still had no explanation about the cancelled flight.

ITA would later email me that the cancellation was due to “extraordinary circumstances” of air traffic control restrictions at Naples, and there would be no refund. Despite other flights departing, apparently, just fine.

Another day of transportation woes driving us to drink.

"Marina Grande" and Sorrento meals

Once we “discovered” it, we ate three meals in Marina Grande - which is not the “big” marina at all, but the small fishing marina in Sorrento. Perversely, the bigger, commercial marina (where the ferries are) is called Marina Piccolo (small marina).

We ate twice at O Puledrone, a restaurant attached to a fishing co-op. Tiny, friendly, delicious.

We also ate at Taverna Azzurra in the marina as well, another family-run establishment.

Back up the hill, in town, we had dinner one night at Fuoro, a highly rated place that proceeded to disappoint. Great rustic atmosphere in the basement dining room, but the food and the service, not so much. Impatient server expressed dismay at our order of only 2 pastas and wine, food was not great and certainly indifferently presented. My “Nonna’s” ravioli hopefully was not made by anyone’s nonna. The mille feuille was…I’m not sure what it was.

One of our best dinners was after our…uh…trying day on the Amalfi Coast. Our son had been to Sorrento last summer and mentioned that he and his crew though Naima Bar was pretty good, so off we went. On a weekday night, we had one of the dining rooms to ourselves and lots of attention.

A Few Hours on Capri

We made a last-minute decision to take a ferry to Capri (pronounced CAH-pree), thinking to spend the day there. Well, we didn’t get to the marina very early and ended up on the noon ferry - with advice from the operator to take the 3:15 ferry back due to some expected rough water later in the afternoon.

Easter Sunday and the ferry was packed, which means the local tiny buses were also packed. We took one up to Capri Town and transferred after a bit of a wait to the bus going to Anacapri, thinking to check out the cable car there.

Well, timing is everything. We wasted so much time on transportation, Anacapri ended up being just a lunch stop and not a great one, although my sandwich was good.

The greens are “rocket” - which is sometimes actually rocket, and sometimes arugula.

Some views on a cloudy breezy day (we did not go to Sushi Fish Lab. I am not sure “sushi” and “lab” should be in the same sentence):

We ended up taking an open-air taxi back to make the ferry on time, a faster but very expensive option. Although it was maybe the best part of the trip.

We would do this again, but would definitely allow more time for the buses, and for wandering around. And we would probably add a boat tour around the island.

More Transit Adventures - Amalfi Edition

We booked a shared day tour of the Amalfi Coast through Mondo Tours. We had originally thought to schedule a boat tour, but had read that the dock at one of the stops (Positano) was closed for construction, so opted for a van instead. (Note: do not, under any circumstances, opt for the public bus. They make it sound cute - and it is cheap. But you will spend hours of your time, standing in line somewhere along the Amalfi coast, watching packed bus after packed bus go by your stop because they have no space.)

The gathering place in Sorrento for the trip was conveniently right in front of our hotel, and our group was small - just 8 people including us. Our driver, Lorenzo, also served as a guide, narrating the entire trip as he drove (and I do mean entire trip), complete with waving arms, sharing photos on his phone, and somehow also navigating the twisty narrow road with the ease of Formula One driver. Here is a snippet:

Lorenzo stopped at a few scenic overlooks, and one time-wasting tourist stop (a ceramic “factory” and optional grotto boat tour), before unloading us at Positano with a few directions and a time to meet back at the van. We had time for a walk down to the beach and a coffee.

We had a choice to go to lunch, or continue down to Ravello and have more time to tour, but once we saw photos of the lunch stop we all opted for that. You can see why:

Then it was off to Ravello, and Amalfi. And here I want to say - I don’t get it. The towns were scenic, certainly…and packed with tourists and tourist shops that were not any different than what we had in Sorrento. Perhaps the holiday crowd affected my perspective (it was the Monday after Easter, an Italian holiday), and maybe the whole experience is better by boat (I suspect it is). But a few pictures regardless (from l-r: view of the gardens at Villa Rufolo in Ravello, section of Villa Rufolo, street in Amalfi, view from Amalfi beach).

Lorenzo had already let us know that we would be late getting back to Sorrento - he guessed closer to 6 pm (usually they are back by 5) due to the huge amount of traffic on the very narrow roads. At some point during the drive to Sorrento, we started to hear a thunking noise from the front wheels. Lorenzo pulled over, checked the tires, saw nothing amiss. The sound got louder. He calls his mechanic (and I am guessing at some of this, it was all in very excitable Italian, complete with hand gestures and imitations of the noise, and holding the speaker phone up so the mechanic can hear the sound, all while making hairpin turns above the sea), and then calls another van driver to (I think) meet at a certain spot to collect us while Lorenzo dealt with the issue.

And suddenly - THUNK.

The front wheel breaks off the van, and we come to a very sudden stop. On a curve. With no shoulder - but luckily NOT on the oceanside of the cliff. I guess?

We have suddenly become a roadside attraction. Cars and pedestrians slow down to marvel at a vanload of tourists and their driver, and a van with a broken front wheel and all sorts of plastic debris scattered across the road. Even the frustrated drivers behind us gawk with dropped jaws as they slowly go around us and see the reason we have stopped. I do not have a photo, but imagine something like this, but messier:

It wasn’t long before one of Lorenzo’s fellow van drivers came to the rescue and scooped us all up for a safe return to Sorrento. I am sure we were not the only passengers who, upon arrival, immediately went off to find a drink.

Food Tours - Our New Touring Discovery

We are new to the food tour scene, but we now plan to add at least one on each trip. In Portugal in spring of 2022, the Rick Steves tour we were on included one in Porto. Both of us thought “Why have we not been doing these?”

Food tours - at least the few we have been on - are designed to give you a taste of local specialties and history. The food included is usually enough for a meal, meaning you won’t need lunch or dinner depending on the timing. Guidebooks and sites like TripAdvisor can direct you to various touring companies (in Porto, it was Taste Porto; in Athens, we used Athens Walks). The groups are usually very small - maybe 12 people at most - and the tours are usually a couple hours. Tour guides have established routes and relationships with a variety of food - and some non-food - vendors.

In Sorrento, we scheduled a tour with Sorrento Food Tours, run by an American now living in Sorrento. Tamara was great and I think we made 8 stops for a variety of snacks and a sit-down dinner of wine, salad and small portion of gnocchi. She even accommodated a food allergy with one of the group members. In addition to the pastry (above), we stopped at a pizzeria, limoncello factory, chocolate shop, charcuterie shop, pasta restaurant, had some local beer, and of course gelato.

Below top row: Saltimbocca (which in Sorrento is a sandwich), limoncello factory, charcuterie tray. Bottom row: charcuterie shop, gnocchi, gelato

Holy Thursday in Sorrento

We were sitting in a cafe on our first evening, eating pizza, when we noticed a crowd gathering in the square. They were waiting on the traditional Holy Thursday processional. Here’s an explanation from the Sorrento Insider website:

Holy Week processions on the Sorrentine peninsula are ritual marches of hooded penitents and clergy who walk slowly down the main streets of town as tribute of the Passion of Jesus Christ.

Each procession is generally organized by a historic "confraternita", or Catholic religious brotherhood and fraternity based around a specific church or parish. Every town on the peninsula is home to a number of different fraternities, so there are generally a variety of processions during Holy Week.

Processions can vary as to the color of the symbolic hooded costumes, times they are held, and music or chanting that may accompany them. Processions usually carry misteri, or symbol of the crucifixion, including nails, shroud, small purse containing Judas' 30 coins, or basin symbolizing the washing of Pontius Pilate's hands. Each procession is also lit by torch or lamplights, and include statues of Christ or the Virgin Mary, incense burners, and choruses singing hymns or chanting prayers.

All processions include a Miserere chorus, with male voices singing a capella, usually a Gregorian composition, at the end of the procession; at the beginning of the procession, there is usually a children's or female chorus accompanied by instruments.

The hoods have a complicated history - they were used during the Inquisition as a public punishment - but are considered a tradition to deflect any attention from the individual penitent, keeping the focus on God.

It was a solemn procession, even if it did take place in a square surrounded by busy bars and restaurants. I was not the only person who left a table to get some photos!

Sorrento - So. Many. Lemons

Have I mentioned I don’t generally like lemon-flavored things? Including limoncello?

You can’t walk 10 feet in Sorrento without bumping into a lemon tree, a lemon stand, or a shop with lemon interior decor, shirts, shoes, hats, dresses, pants, tiles, drinks, gelato, baked goods…the list goes on and on. It’s a little…much. But I am not complaining - Sorrento is where our trip was finally working out as planned.

Looks at us, all healthy and happy

Hotel Breakfast

OMG it was ridiculous. Not shown: two kinds of eggs, beans, mushrooms, cheeses, cold cuts, croissants, yogurt, fruit, cereals, make-your-own-mimosas, and about 10 more baked goods than shown here.

From Rome to Sorrento

Video: on the train between Naples and Sorrento, view of Vesuvius

Five days out from my initial COVID symptoms, we headed to Sorrento (masked of course). Since we were staying near Rome Termini (train station), getting to Sorrento was pretty simple: express train to Naples, switch to the Circumvesuviana (local train), get off at Sorrento (end of the line).

But then Citi Visa decided to flag my card for fraud when I tried to buy tickets via the Trenitalia app. Despite A) knowing I was traveling, and B) 10 days of Visa use so far - in Italy. And while we waited for that to get sorted (Visa did manage to call me eventually, apologize for the “error” and reinstate the card) we walked over to the train station and bought tickets at the kiosk for the first leg to Naples.

The train to Naples worked just fine, but Naples being - well, Naples - the local train was a bit of a chore. We bought our tickets, hoping to get the next train…and it was cancelled. No reason provided (this is a recurring theme of this trip, and possibly of Italy transportation in general). So we waited 45 minutes, along with about 500 other people in the same situation. Plus another few hundred people, showing up for this later train.

I have not been on a train this packed since I was in NYC during the Pride Parade. My comment to Bob - “I think half this train will get off at Pompeii” - turned out, thankfully, to be true.

We made it to Sorrento - later than planned, also a theme of this trip - and checked into the Hotel Antiche Mura. Beautiful hotel, great location, and a breakfast that deserves its own post.

Wandering in Trastevere

Our search for outside things to do had us wandering over the Tiber to the Trastevere neighborhood. Originally a working-class neighborhood, this area is now considered hip and bohemian. It’s touristy, but with a different vibe. It’s quieter (you notice this immediately), and you’ll find some different shops and products here.

We used the Rick Steves audio tour to start off (see? no hard feelings here!), and it was easy to follow. We did visit the Basilica Santa Cecilia, a 5th century church dedicated to St Cecilia, patron saint of musicians, who was, of course, a virgin, even throughout her marriage. The church was built over the remains of her villa and you can pay a couple of euro to go downstairs if it’s open.

We had lunch at a touristy spot, which did not make it any less delicious.

And gelato, where they had this “new flavor.” Which we did not try.

When in Rome...with COVID

Sigh. Another 5 days of figuring out what to do when you can’t do things, this time in Rome trying not to infect the Easter week masses. Luckily, we’ve been to Rome before, so felt no need to head to the Forum, the Coliseum, the Vatican (cool as those things are) - which was good, because Rome was pretty much sold out. I looked at getting tickets to the Borghese Gallery, it was sold out for weeks. Not that I would be going inside anywhere for a bit.

Pathway at the Borghese Gardens

We did walk up to the Borghese Gardens, often compared to Central Park in New York. But without the people. And the dogs. And the coffee. Seriously, it is a nice park and we were there on a chilly day in early April, which could account for the lack of activity.

We also traipsed over to the Trastevere neighborhood (see next post). And spent some time checking out Roman kitties living to good life in some random ruins in the middle of town:

And I provided this update to my brother:

Getting to Rome (and the first of many transportation snafus)

When we decided to change our plans and fly to Rome for several days, we already had a flight booked on RyanAir out of Catania. It was super easy to change the flight on their app - in fact, their app is great. Easy to make changes, easy to see schedules, they even show you the fare differences as you scroll through the choices.

Italian airport workers had called for a strike on our departure day, but politely scheduled it in advance for 1-5 pm. So I booked a 10:55 am flight to avoid whatever impacts the strike was going to have.

We arrived at the Palermo airport, and proceeded to experience delay after delay after delay - all while watching other flights board and take-off with no issues. Including the 12:15 RyanAir flight to Rome. No explanation was provided. At some point, we figured out that we could get food vouchers by presenting our boarding passes at the two food vendors (and the food was pretty awful).

And I was getting The Cold. Just to make everything even more miserable than it already was.

Palermo airport is small and definitely not set up for passengers hanging around for 6 hours - no lounge, very little seating, limited electrical outlets. We were masked, but kept moving to keep away from people as best we could. Bob at least was COVID negative, but as the afternoon wore on I was pretty sure I wasn’t.

SIX HOURS after our original departure time, we boarded a plane for Rome. Got the train into town, where it started to rain, because of course it did. We walked by the Hotel Cellini twice before spotting the subtle brass sign on the side of the doorway.

The room was nice, and spacious, which was good since we would be spending some time in it - I tested positive for COVID that evening

Palermo Food

With more days that we needed in Palermo, and not much we could do with them due to COVID, we walked around town and…ate. This is not everything we ate - we had a few takeout meals of pizza and panini. Also, gelato.

Caponata (Via Vittorio Emanuele, 244): the word caponata actually refers to an eggplant dish. although this place serves way more than that. We went twice (once for pizza), and it was very good. From l-r: Grilled octopus, anchovy balls, seafood pasta, spaghetti with clams.

We wandered to the waterfront several times, which is very walkable with parks and pathways. Went to A’Cala (Via Cala - which is the La Cala Harbor) twice for lunch. $20 for the whole grilled sea bream. From l-r: grilled sea bream, grilled salmon, tempura shrimp.

Trattoria Old School de Anto (Piazza Teatro Santa Cecilia, 13) was around the corner from the hotel. Huge portions - server was concerned I did not like my pasta alle vongole (pasta with clams), but the problem was they served enough for 2 people, even in American portions. From l-r: spaghetti with clams, salad, lasagna, tiramasu.

Ke Palle (Via Maqueda, 270) calls themselves the Author of Arancini, and maybe they are? All we know is it was all amazing. These are not “American” arancini - you know, those walnut-sized appetizers. These are meals, the size of a baseball, and usually eaten like a sandwich. All types of seafood, vegetable and cheese combinations are available here. The cannoli shop is conveniently located next door.

Palermo Attractions

Unfortunately - or fortunately I guess - for us, we managed to see several Palermo highlights prior to the COVID situation. The image above (from online) is of one of many sections in the Capuchin Crypts. The monks here discovered the dry air of the crypt preserved bodies pretty well and developed additional embalming techniques, initially used only on their own deceased residents, but later expanded to anyone who could pay. It became quite the thing for the wealthy to be embalmed and displayed here, and has resulted in an excellently creepy attraction.

We also visited the Teatro Massimo, which is still used for musical and theatrical productions:

Prior to being removed from our Rick Steves tour, we had a walking tour of the historic center, which ended up being more useful than we thought after we were stuck in the city on our own for a few days. We went to Palazzo Conte Federico for a personal tour from Contessa Alwine Federico, as well as a trip to the Monreale Cathedral, a huge Norman-style basilica with fantastic interior mosaics.

Contessa Federico greets our group at her home

Inside the cathedral at Monreale

After the COVID diagnosis, the touring came to an abrupt halt. Luckily the weather was good, so we could walk around the city…and eat. Next post!

Flexing the COVID-Affected Italy Travel Plan

“OMG, what did you do?” you may be asking yourself.

Well, the stress levels went up a bit, let me tell you. Rick Steves Europe is a great tour company, but it’s definitely not a hand-holding operation. And they are quite clear about that - you book your own airfare, figure out how to get to the starting hotel, deal with your own luggage, etc. And if you get COVID, well…you are on your own pretty much.

Which is understandable - the guides have 20 other people to deal with, and a schedule to keep. I think Bob said it best when communciating with the tour office - “Leaving the tour is by its nature I suppose a rather abrupt process—one day you’re comfortably on the tour with plans firmly set and the next day you’re essentially orphaned in a hotel room in Palermo Sicily with no plan.  Mentally you need to work through that change in a hurry.  We understood the RS no hand holding policy regarding leaving tours, but it’s another thing to experience it firsthand.”  

We spent the first part of the day dealing with immediate concerns. Our guide arranged for us to stay another 3 nights at the tour hotel - we had to check out Sunday, the hotel had no availability after that. We got on the phone with TravelGuard travel insurance to find out what would be required for any claims. We communicated with Rick Steves Europe about documentation for insurance and the prorated refund we would get from the tour. We contacted On Call Global Assistance, the resource the tour contracted with for exactly this kind of situation, and found them useless. The best resource? Hotel front desk staff. They were awesome.

Then we walked down the street to a pharmacy that offered COVID testing, so we would have the required documentation for travel insurance - and, oddly, for Rick Steves Europe. Despite the fact that the initial test was administered by their guide, and we were kicked off the tour by Rick Steves Europe - we had to provide proof of the positive test to initiate the refund. (note: they did say “self-test” results were accepted, but no info on what, exactly, that could be. A photo? Don’t know.)

And then we went to lunch. This is what someone with COVID looks like at an outdoor waterfront restaurant in Palermo:

We discussed next steps, and decided to look at continuing to tour Sicily on our own. Maybe take the train Sunday to Catania, do day-trips from there to Mt Etna, Siracusa and Taormina. Then continue with the original plan to fly from Catania to Naples and travel to Sorrento.

And then we looked at the weather. Rain. All week.

New plan! After exploring a possible Cinque Terra option, we decided on Rome. I easily changed our flight on RyanAir (and it was so easy, their app was great to use…the actual flight, not so much). Could not believe my luck in finding a room at Hotel Cellini, not far from the Rome train station and walkable to pretty much everything - it was, after all, the week before Easter.

And then we sat back and tried to figure out what to do with 3 unexpected days in Palermo, with COVID restricting what we felt we could responsibly do.

That Time We Got COVID in Italy

We booked an 11-day Rick Steves tour of Sicily for March-April. The original plan was to fly into Rome, spend the night, and fly to Palermo the next day (which would be one day before the tour started).

The Sicily tour started in Palermo and ended in Catania. We decided to add some extra days in Sorrento before flying home, so booked a flight from Catania to Naples, where we would take a train or a bus to Sorrento. After our stay there, we chose to travel back to Naples and fly to Rome, spend the night again and fly home the next day.

One of our more complicated trips in terms of transportation logistics, but nothing too unusual. And we built in plenty of extra time in the itinerary. Keep this in mind for later!

And it all would have been great…until Bob got cold symptoms on Day 2 of the tour in Palermo, requiring the tour leader to test for COVID. Note that if we had been on our own, or at home, it would not have occurred to us to test. The symptoms were so minor - a runny nose, some sneezing, slight post-nasal-drip cough. No fever, no aches, no major cough, not tired, nothing.

Once you test positive, you are done with the tour and cannot rejoin (more on that later). And just like that, we are on our own in Italy, with 9 days of scheduled activities, hotel stays and transportation - gone. Plus, one of us has COVID. And the other one is resigned to getting it too at some point.

The end result was a whole lot of days of…not much. So this travelogue will be structured a bit differently. Read on!