Thursday, October 29, 2009
The Much Anticipated Finale ♥ 10:23 AM
Okay, so months later I'm finally going to wrap this blog up.
Picking up from last time, Mom and I spent our last day exploring a bit more of Florence and then took the Eurostar back to Rome. By this point I was exhausted so I stayed in the hotel to rest for a bit while she went out to find some small gifts to take home with us. Then she came back and we went out to dinner at a nice restaurant that the Rick Steve's book recommended and headed home to pack and try to get an early nights sleep since we had to leave early.
The next morning we woke up early and and took the metro to the train station, got on the train to the airport and thought we were off to the start of a good day. Unfortunatly that wouldn't last long. When we got to the airport to check in we were told that my ticket was cancelled. My mom had bought a round trip ticket from Minneapolis to Rome and back to Minneapolis, but since 9/11 they changed their policly so that if you are not on the first leg of your flight they will cancel your return trip. So being rushed for time (because they close check in an hour before the flight), we didnt' have time to put mom's ticket in my name and she had to hurry onto the plane while I stayed behind to try and figure everything out.
They wanted me to buy another $3,000 ticket home, and told me I had until 11 to buy the ticket or else it would go to someone else. All of th eir flights were already overbooked and crazy so I was pretty nervous, plus with the time difference and the fact that I had very few phone numbers for people back home since I didn't have my phone it was going to be difficult to get a hold of people. Luckily, thanks to a phon card and the modern technology of being able to send a text message through the internet I was able to get a hold of my step-dad Jeff and he helped to figure everything out. I was stuck in the airport for 24 hours, but I made a friend. There was another girl there my age who was stuck there for a day so we banded together and looked out for eachothers stuff as we slept and found strength in numbers.
I had some more bad luck in New York, they mixed up my gate numbers and the flight was delayed for a few house. In the end I didn't get home till about 1 AM, about 30 hours after I was supposed to. But it was worth it even though it was stressful.
Overall, my whole trip this summer was an amazing experience - probably the best of my life. I miss being in London almost everyday that I'm home and hope that someday I'll be able to go back.
Here's the final collection of photos, enjoy!
The End.