Day 1:
Flight: London-Stansted to Milan-Bergamo on Thursday, April 1, 2010 at 14:00
Adventurers: Jen, Kelli, Christina, and me
Christina left her house in Margate at 8 am to drive to Canterbury to pick me up at 9. I gave her a short tour of our house and then we left at about 9:15 to Bearsted to head to Jen's house. After one near death experience in a roundabout (yes I do mean NEAR DEATH...we were in the wrong lane to go around the roundabout and another car almost slammed into us as it exited..YIKES!), we arrived safely at Jen's house around 10:05. Meanwhile, Jen was on the phone with Kelli attempting to direct her back on course, as Kelli had made a wrong turn on her trek from Tunbridge Wells.
The four of us left Jen's via Christina's car headed to London-Stansted with a quick stop at the post office to turn a little pounds into more euros. The drive to Stansted is projected to take about an hour to 1.5 hours depending on the circumstances that one crosses along the way.
The second mishap (the first being the near death roundabout experience) occurred, when we ended up in the construction barricaded center lane when we needed to exit onto another motorway. Nevertheless, we trotted on an extra 3 miles to the next exit to turn around and get back on track.
Third mishap : OH NO! As we were exiting the motorway toward the 'long stay car park,' Christina said, "uh-oh...I think there is something wrong with the car!" as she coasted to the shoulder of the roundabout. She stopped the car and attempted to start it again....NOTHING. I said, "did you run out of gas?" "hmmm...I don't know--I had over half a tank when I left my house this morning." UGH....if you reread the first part of the story so far, you will soon realize that YES we had run out of gas (about two hours before our flight, I might add), as Christina had already been driving for HOURS.
While Christina called the recovery number to have someone bring us gas, I got out of the car to look around. I decided that I would walk down the exit ramp to see if there were any gas stations within walking distance, because I could not sit in the car and count as the minutes ticked closer to take off time. Kelli joined me as we marched down the exit like idiots.
Down the exit and up the road, we found a Hilton that we walked to. After making a plan to take one of the taxis at the Hilton to a gas station, I called Jen, who said that the recovery guy was 10 minutes away. PERFECT!!! I told Jen we would wait at the Hilton. A few minutes later, I got a call from Jen saying that the recovery man was on the wrong side of the motorway and it would take him too long to turn around, so he would have to call into his office to have another person dispatched. WHAT?!?!?! Jen said that Christina wanted her to grab our bags and meet us to take a taxi to the airport so the 3 of us would make the flight since by this point we had less than a hour and a half until take off. Feeling super sorry for Christina, but more sad that we may miss our flight, Jen grabbed our bags and walked our direction as we walked hers.
Here's Pack Mule Jen!
After we met, I called the taxi number I received from the Hilton. Unfortunately, the taxi company said it would take 10 minutes to get to us. Instead, we chose to walk back to the Hilton to look for a taxi or catch the shuttle.
We caught the shuttle, scrounged up 20 pounds because we thought the driver said 6 pounds each, but no, he meant 6 pounds for all of us, and headed to the airport.
After Kelli's fabulous "we must expect the unexpected, because nothing ever turns out the way you expect in England" Speech. BRILLIANT!!
In the airport, we rushed to get our passport checked at check-in and through security, where my bag was completely dumped and searched thanks to my bottle of mousse. After a quick repack, I met the other two girls at to grab a sandwich. (about 35 minutes until take off). As we started walking to the gate, we noticed a sign that said 12 minutes to all gates. WHAT?!?!?! Our tickets said we must be at the gate 30 minutes before take off or we cannot get on. CRAP....
So....this is the part of the story where we ran through the airport dodging people and scaling escalators. There was NO WAY I was missing a flight I had worked so hard to make! When we arrived to at the gate, OF COURSE the line was super long and they had not even begun boarding (so much for our run).... So, we stood in line for the next 20 minutes catching our breath, peeling off layers of clothing, and eating our sandwiches.
Poor Christina Update: The recovery man came an hour and a half after we left her car. He towed her to the nearest gas station because recovery cars do not carry gas in their cars (WHAT?!?!). Christina chose not to change her flight, and instead spent the weekend in London with some other Americans.
Thankfully, there is nothing exciting to report from the airplane. It did, however, mark my first Ryan Air flight!! People that have lived in Europe will understand the excitement of this. Cheap flight = no free drink, a hideous yellow and blue decor, lovely flight attendants from all over the world, who try to sell items to people over the entire ie: food, drinks, train tickets, scratch off lottery tickets, smokeless cigarettes...not even kidding!
We arrived in rainy Milan and caught a hour long bus ride into the city train station, where we managed to figure out which bus to hop on in order to go to our hostel. Unfortunately, we did not figure out how to pay for the bus ride, so we sat nervously hoping no one would ask to see our tickets. Thankfully, we discovered which stop to get off at, and walked around in circles to find our hostel.
Check in went okay besides the fact the man said he wouldn't cut the price even though we lost a person. After that, we walked around town attempting to find a good Italian place to eat and then went back to the hostel/hotel to get some sleep.
My first REAL Italian PIZZA!!!
Adventures of DAY 2 to come!!
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