Day Thirteen: Sunday, April 27 - Departure
Breakfast: Breakfast at the hotel; continental style for participants with early morning departure.
Morning: Coach to and Depart from Naples airport.
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Some folks had to take the 4AM bus to Naples. Fortunately, I had a later flight, and I left Minori at 9AM. The Naples airport is a manageable size. I had only 1 1/2 hours to make my connection in Rome, a huge airport, and I had arranged for assistance. Even with assistance, there was not a lot of room to spare.
The flight from Rome to JFK was uneventful. I had arranged for an upgrade to the economy seating. This meant I had a slightly larger seat, and it included sound-cancelling headphones with which to watch the movies. That helped a bit. But it was still a long flight! Wine, juice, coffee, and water were available during the flight. Lunch was adequate, barely. The "snack" served a couple of hours before arriving in NY was not.
Arrival at JFK was smooth and on time. Again, I had assistance getting through the terminals, and that helped quite a bit. I had a couple of hours to wait for my next flight, and I sat in a comfortable chair surrounded by people waiting for flights to Buffalo, Rochester, Toronto, and Syracuse. They announced that all four planes were on the ground, but the traffic on the ground meant they could not get to the gates. My plane arrived at the gate 30 minutes late, I boarded, and we moved from the gate. Thirty minutes later, we were still waiting to take off. My plane finally landed an hour and a half later than expected. I had arranged for a hotel for the night, and D would pick me up in the morning.
Now, more excitement. . . No luggage. I had packed a shirt and underwear in my carryon. The airline gave me an emergency kit that included toothbrush, T-Shirt, deodorant, so I was all set. I had carried my special things - ipad, cameras, chargers, etc., with me. I was in bed by 1:30. Of course, to my head, it was 7:30 in the morning.
D picked me up before 8AM, and I was ready to be in my own home.
The luggage was delivered at 2:30 PM, and I was able to get laundry done and get ready to return to home life. The only thing missing from my luggage was the batteries (I had had them in the carryon on the way over, as you are supposed to do, but I had checked the carryon to return, and I forgot to transfer them. Also missing was a tin of Altoids. There was no TSA note that the bag had been opened. There was nothing of value in the bags, and nothing else was missing. I was worried about the limoncello and olive oil, but they arrived intact.
Even the cold, drizzly days look good. It will take a bit of time to readjust my mental clock. It's hard to get back to a sleep and eating schedule. They say it takes a day for each hour of adjustment, so I should be good by the weekend.
Great memories of a wonderful two weeks. I sure would like some gelato! And I miss the breakfasts of fresh fruit, cookies, cheese, and ham.
2 comments:
TSA is a US government agency; the Europeans may not bother to put a little paper in your case if they search or remove stuff.
Second issue: were the batteries that were removed lithium? They are known to overheat and if too many of them are close together, they can explode or burst into flames. Obviously, the few that you had packed were probably not going to cause a problem, but I think it is currently against regulations to pack those in checked luggage.
The batteries were the standard AA batteries for the camera. I had taped the terminals with electrical tape so they could not touch and discharge accidentally. But I should have transferred them to the carryon - I forgot.
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