2004
Tuesday, July 13 - Roma - Firenze
Lodging: Il Palagio B&B (phone = +39 055 5520642; email address = info@il-palagio.it; Internet = www.il-palagio.it) ; plan to stay until July 17th

I made decent time and arrived in Brussels (from JFK NY) at 8am. I then walked through the airport/mall and took several pictures during my hour layover. My next flight, Brussels to Roma, was a smaller plane owned by SN Brussels and was a very pleasant flight. We were slightly delayed due to traffic problems in Roma.

Once landing in Roma, I quickly met up with my sister who had correctly guessed where I came out. I did not have to go through customs. Evidently, going through customs in Brussels was sufficient. We headed for the train station and spent some confusing times on trying to figure out how to get to our train to Florence. We ended up taking a train to central station (9.5 euros each) and then ate lunch at McDonalds and waited for the next train to Florence. We finally got on the train to Florence at 2:47pm.

The Eurail train to Florence was very comfortable, quiet and relaxing (see http://www.raileurope.com for more information). We had seen a lot of people in the last many hours, so this was a nice change. Erica and I both slept. I believe we got off the train (after trying too early a couple of times) at central station in Firenze (Florence). We were both very wiped out by this time.

We spent the next several minutes trying to figure out where to eat. We finally decided upon a McDonalds, found a seat (very crowded) and I went to get the food. We noticed that personal space is less recognized in Europe. People were on top of each other and no one has a problem bumping into you to go where they want to go. I got the food and we ate much needed food.

We then found a tourism office where we got rough directions to the Il Pallaio B&B (take bus #17 and get off at a certain street that shall remain unnamed). We found the bus area, got on bus 17 rather quickly. We couldn't figure out how to pay for the bus and no one seemed concerned about it. We managed to get off at the right street but nothing told us where our B&B was. I made several guesses and eventually ended up right next to it. We quickly made it to our room and arrived at 6:10pm. Erica and I were both ready to crash. We had been traveling for a long time (24 hours for Erica, 30 for me). We took turns on showers and got ready for bed. I had hoped for some dinner, but sleep won. When I went to sleep, I didn't move at all for about 10.5 hours...

Our lodging in Florence is the Il Palagio B&B (phone = +39 055 5520642; email address = info@il-palagio.it) and we plan to stay until July 17th.