Well, here we sit in a coffee shop near the airport at 2AM.  We took the 2nd last airport bus from Florence at 11 o’clock and thought we’d just stay at the airport until check-in time as we knew we wouldn’t sleep at home anyhow and we weren’t sure if we could get a taxi at 3AM.  Big mistake.  We were all settled in near our check-in spot and as you can see from the picture below, I was quite comfortable. Joey was laughing at me so hard I thought she was going to fall over.  I would have put my jammies on but I think she would have put her foot down.  I was just nicely dozing off when a booming voice startled me awake and a rather large security guard told us we had to leave as the airport was shutting down until 4AM.  He said we could go to the 24-hour coffee shop across the parking lot and wait there.  We were a little shocked.  We had to pack up and put all our snacks and gear away and get out.  Four other people did the same and we all walked towards the cafe together.  A fence blocked us at every turn and we ended up right back at the airport entrance.  We saw another road and took that one which led us past the hookers and into the coffee shop.  Nothing is easy.

Joey is now reading and three of the other group are asleep with their heads on the table.  We do have stories to tell no matter where we go.

This isn’t the only excitement we’ve had.  I was sitting watching TV around 1 o’clock  yesterday and Joey was packing.  All of a sudden the sofa started “shivering” and I yelled at Joey to come quickly.  She came to the living room and I asked her if she could feel that. She said, “feel what”?  I told her to sit down and as soon as she did she could feel the vibration.  The windows rattled and the curtains moved and it was a bit scary to say the least.  We turned to a news channel and although we couldn’t understand what they were saying, we did understand that 6.7 aftershocks in the town of Norcia, 152 miles south of us, were happening.  They had suffered massive damage and 300 people had been killed back in August and now they were being hit again.  Such a sad day for those poor people.  We both agreed it was time to go home.

On a brighter note, we did get out and about on our last day here.  It was a beautiful, warm day and the crowds of people, both local and tourists were all out enjoying the afternoon. We stopped for lunch when we finally found a place that we could sit down at.  Joey had her usual sandwich and I had my final gelato of the trip.  So good! We walked for some time but finally got tired of fighting the crowds and came home to do our final packing and rest.

Tonight we chose an outdoor restaurant in our favorite piazza.  We both had home made pasta, mine with meat sauce and Joey’s with seafood.  We washed it all down with a bottle of wine and people watched until the cool air chased us home. It was a lovely way to spend our final night in Florence.

Only a little more than an hour left and we can go back to the airport.  Our flight leaves at 6:30 with a 2 1/2 hour flight to Amsterdam, a four-hour wait there and then nine hours to Vancouver.  Joey’s daughter is meeting her there and I have another four-hour wait for my flight to Edmonton.  I may never get over the jet lag!