We are flying in business class because of our frequent flyer reward ticket. Frankly, this business class thing is a bit ridiculous. We have access to the ‘business class lounges.’ The lounge at the Bologna airport has an attendant making cappuccino, caffé etc. and as ever, there is a wide variety of pastry items. The people in the business/first class lounge get their own security line, separated from, and not visible to, the security line for everybody else. Of course there is no line-up at all so one can breeze right through and the Italians are very casual and nice about it all.
We had e-mailed the people who run the B&B in Bologna and told them not to bother putting out any breakfast for us this morning as it is all sweets and we wanted to leave for the airport before breakfast anyway. We were the only guests and had the place to ourselves as the owners seem to live elsewhere. It was a good thing we skipped breakfast, for on the plane to Munich, we got salmon with artichoke and salad, which was very good, which says a lot, as we are not partial to fish.
In Munich, the Lufthansa business lounge is very large and by Italian standards, the coffee is terrible, ha. They have a large buffet of food and endless bottles of beer, wine, sparkling wine and other drinks. It is all crazy, really. We had a 3.5 hour wait in Munich and the lounge was very comfortable with nice seating, newspapers, shower rooms with attendant, etc.
The flight from Munich to Chicago was very good, given that we had all kinds of perks, such as lie-flat seats, French champagne, good food, linen, dishware, a very friendly German flight attendant and on and on. The 3 hour flight to Regina from Chicago was on the horrible small plane with viciously uncomfortable seats.
The weather at home is a shock to the system, cold and snow. This was a really fabulous trip, I don’t know how we will surpass this one given all the ancient architecture and ruins we got to see. The friendly and helpful Italians were wonderful as we gestured and mispronounced everything in our severely limited Italian vocabulary. We do not take travel for granted and are grateful to have had the opportunity to visit Italy.
We are left with a real affinity for Sicily, beautiful people and a beautiful land with an incredible ancient architectural heritage.
We will finish up with a few kooky photos that John has picked from his file of eight billion Italy photos.
Hooded crow at the Baths of Caracalla, Rome
Sun seeking turtle at Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli
The very top of 115 foot obelisk, Fountain of the Four Rivers, Piazza Navona, Rome
Monumental Seagull, Piazza Navona, Rome
Napping pigeons in Doric column, Temple of Apollo, Siracusa
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