We slept through the alarm and grudgingly rolled out at 10:30AM. [welllll it HAD been a long day] Having missed our chance to catch the early express to Civitavecchia [you'll understand why this was critical in the next episode] we scrambled packing to make the check out time… which we also blew past. But dear Cristiano and Simona were more than gracious and held our bags as we grabbed a quick lunch at the little bar across the street. [Cristiano made it clear that Italians DO NOT do Quick Lunch]
2 coffees, 2 croissants and a couple bottles of water later 
and after taking note of "Pagine Gialle", Rome's version of the Yellow Pages, we retrieved our bagagli and had them call a cab. Getting a cab in Rome is unique. They push a button on a special machine that rings in the closest Radio Taxi station that dispatches a Taxi, printing out the Taxi’s number and the approx minutes till they arrive. Of course the meter starts as soon as they leave the local stand, which is exactly €2 away. This made the basic trip back to Termini more on the meter than the one coming, but there was no termini surcharge or bag fee so it actually was cheaper. Go figure…
Wanting to make sure I got the next express to Civitavecchia I bypassed the confusing automat and stood in line for an agent. Ticket in hand we checked the monitors for the "Binario” [platform]. Since it was only NOON and the train didn't leave till 1:46 it wasn’t posted. We wound up in the snack bar at a table near an outlet to edit NOWAT and of course… none of the outlets in the snack bar were hot so we burned out the extended battery which wasn’t holding an extended charge.
While Illy edited, I went in search for the AVIS location, which had moved to the opposite side of the station. I needed to know where to return the car rented for the Winery run.
When I returned Illy packed up the laptop and we went in search of the train, which originally was to be Binario #18, then #20 according to the nice Transit Polizia, who I had to find again cause that wasn’t the right train. After he apologized profusely we found it was binario #25. We'll great… but where in the hell was #25. Illy finally found a small sign pointing to the rear of #20 and “aproprio li” there it was… all….the….way…back….there. Now it was a race to get to Carrozza 006 Posti Finestrino 83 & 85 Mediano [Car 6, Seats 83 Window & 85 Middle].
With room for only her bag, the carryons and our coats on the overhead rack, the big suitcase had to stay in the corridor next to the cabin door, which of course blocked half the aisle as others boarded. And then we were off for a 90 minute run to the Port of Civitavecchia. With no major chaos so far, we settled in for a restful ride. We'll save arrival at the port and the rest of the day for the next episode.
Ciao 4 Now,
Chuck and the happy nothing strange happened so far, Dragon Lady
Wanting to make sure I got the next express to Civitavecchia I bypassed the confusing automat and stood in line for an agent. Ticket in hand we checked the monitors for the "Binario” [platform]. Since it was only NOON and the train didn't leave till 1:46 it wasn’t posted. We wound up in the snack bar at a table near an outlet to edit NOWAT and of course… none of the outlets in the snack bar were hot so we burned out the extended battery which wasn’t holding an extended charge.
While Illy edited, I went in search for the AVIS location, which had moved to the opposite side of the station. I needed to know where to return the car rented for the Winery run.
When I returned Illy packed up the laptop and we went in search of the train, which originally was to be Binario #18, then #20 according to the nice Transit Polizia, who I had to find again cause that wasn’t the right train. After he apologized profusely we found it was binario #25. We'll great… but where in the hell was #25. Illy finally found a small sign pointing to the rear of #20 and “aproprio li” there it was… all….the….way…back….there. Now it was a race to get to Carrozza 006 Posti Finestrino 83 & 85 Mediano [Car 6, Seats 83 Window & 85 Middle].
With room for only her bag, the carryons and our coats on the overhead rack, the big suitcase had to stay in the corridor next to the cabin door, which of course blocked half the aisle as others boarded. And then we were off for a 90 minute run to the Port of Civitavecchia. With no major chaos so far, we settled in for a restful ride. We'll save arrival at the port and the rest of the day for the next episode.
Ciao 4 Now,
Chuck and the happy nothing strange happened so far, Dragon Lady
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