Italy

We had an early flight out of London Luton on Friday morning (December 29th) to Venice.  We found our accommodation for Venice, but we had to wait a long time to check in.  The whole place was locked when we got there - it wasn't a normal motel with someone at the desk.  We called someone, but they told us to come back later.  So we took all our stuff, found a pizza place, sat at a park for an hour, and then waited outside the motel for another 45 minutes or so.  We tried looking for other accommodations while we were waiting, but couldn't find anything less than $300/night.  So we waited for someone to let us in.  Finally got checked in and left our stuff there, but we had already wasted about 4-5 hours sitting around.  

And then we saw our room... and I really wished we had found something else.  The bathroom had a ton of mold on the wall, the shower was just a drain by the toilet (with a handheld showerhead), and there were only 2 double beds.  We were supposed to get 2 queens and a single.  Plus there was no sofa - just a small room with 2 double beds.  We piled 3 of us on each bed and one person slept on the floor (on a sleeping pad that we brought).  

We went into Venice that evening, but mostly ended up walking all over looking for a bathroom.  It was really hard to find any bathrooms!  We finally found one and paid 3 pounds for me to take Weston and Savannah in the bathroom.  And then they had to go again later... the 2nd time we let them pee on the ground, along a wall where no one was.  It was a cold night too, so we didn't have a very good experience in Venice.  Everything was really overpriced, and it was more grungy than I expected.  The Christmas lights were pretty though.  

This was funny - trying to watch Weston eat pizza with a fork:

We spent only part of Saturday in Venice - just long enough to take an 80 pound gondola ride for 30 minutes (or less).  Luckily they let us ride all together on one gondola - the limit was supposed to be 6 people.  They let Savannah be on our lap.  (Alex said if they were going to make us pay for 2 gondolas that he would let the rest of us go and he would sit it out.)

We had pizza lunch, ice cream, took some pictures, and wandered around just a bit.  Then we decided to go to Bassano del Grappo, a hour's train ride away.
 

We thought Bassano del Grappo was a hidden gem.  It was a really pretty town with mountains. We had never heard of it before, but liked it just as much, if not more than Venice. Of course the Christmas lights made a big difference.  I don't know if we would have liked these places as much during the summer (with heat and crowds).  It was crowded enough during off season.  But Bassano del Grappo wasn't as crowded either.  We were glad we went there.  

On Sunday morning (December 31st), we packed up all our stuff and checked out of our crummy motel.  We found the local ward for our church and went to sacrament meeting.  It was all in Italian, so we didn't understand anything, but we were there to take the sacrament.  After sacrament meeting, we took a high speed train from Venice to Rome. 

New Year's Eve will be remembered as one of the most stressful and heartbreaking days for us.  It started off okay - we made it to our motel and got some dinner.  Alex talked to his brother Jim on the phone for about 30 minutes (Alex usually talks to his family every Sunday).  And then around 8:00pm or so we headed out to explore Rome.  We wandered around for a while, making our way to the Trevi Fountain, where we did the traditional throw coins over our shoulder (to assure a return to Rome).  All of the Christmas lights were pretty throughout the city.

We planned on watching fireworks at the Colosseum, realizing there would probably be lots of people there, but thinking it would be memorable to celebrate New Year's there.  It was definitely memorable, but not in a good way!  We didn't realize just how bad the crowds would be - and it wasn't too bad once we actually got to the Colosseum.  But it was our experience with the metro that really scared me.  When we got to the metro, we were about 2nd in line to get on.  But as soon as it arrived and the doors opened, there was a massive push to get on.  We were getting crushed!  I thought Savannah was going to get crushed or trampled.  Protective mom came out of me, and I started yelling at people and pushing back with my elbows trying to create space.  It was useless though, because the people behind us were getting pushed from behind them - just a massive collective push from the crowd.  I was starting to panic though with the kids.  Luckily we made it on the metro and to the Colosseum.  I breathed a sigh of relief when we got some space at the Colosseum and found a spot on the hill to watch the fireworks.  I was hoping we would never have to go through that again.  But...as we were leaving, we were soon in the same situation.  We even left quickly after the fireworks were finished.  Most people were still celebrating, so we thought we were getting out early enough to beat the metro crowd.  But we quickly got caught up in a tight crowd, pushing with nowhere or way to get out.  We got Savannah on Alex's shoulders so she wouldn't get crushed, but Weston was getting squeezed in.  I had to push back and yell "There are kids here!"  But again it was useless.  I have never felt so confined and helpless.  We finally got pushed in towards the ticket gates of the metro only to find out they they weren't running the metro.  Probably a smart move on their part, because it wasn't safe with the crowds pushing by the tracks.  We had to work our way back out and finally got some space to walk.  I think it was only about a mile back to our motel - if I had known that before, we would have walked to the Colosseum as well.  It was pretty amazing to be there and watch the fireworks, but I would never do that again (especially not with kids). 

Savannah fell asleep on Alex's shoulders on the walk back to our motel.  We were all exhausted (our day had started in Venice.)  

We weren't prepared for the news when we arrived at our motel.  Aunt Jane had tried to call Alex, and he called her back when we got in (about 1:00am).  Aunt Jane told us the sad news that Alex's brother Jim had a heart attack and passed away about 30 minutes before that.  We couldn't believe it - Alex had just talked to him about 4 hours prior to that.  We were devastated, but consider it a tender mercy that Alex had been able to talk to Jim (and hadn't missed that Sunday call even though we were on vacation).  I'll talk some more about Jim in another post. 

We spent the rest of the night and the next day grieving and trying to figure out how to get back to the states.  We finally decided that just Alex would fly back for Jim's funeral.  I wanted to go, but I had to step back from the emotional decision and make a rational decision.  We decided not to spend the $6000+ for all of us to fly back.  I hated that money was a factor in the decision, but in the end, I don't think Jim would have wanted us to spend so much of our savings to come to his funeral.  Owen was the most upset, but he understood. 

We found a way to get back early from Italy.  We still had 1 night in Rome, La Spezia, Genoa, and 3 nights in Amsterdam at that point.  We found a train back to Venice on Wednesday and a flight to Edinburgh.  (Easy Jet kindly gave us vouchers for our original flights from Milan to Amsterdam and then to Edinburgh.  We couldn't get the 4 nights accommodations refunded.)  We stayed in Rome on New Year's Day - aside from making travel arrangements, we ventured out in the evening for dinner and to see the Rome Temple.  It was under construction, with a fence around it, and it was dark when we got there  - so we couldn't see it very well.  But it brought some comfort just standing near the temple.  Temples stand as a witness of our belief in life after death, and the work we do in temples unites families.  We know that we will see Jim again someday and that we can do sacred ordinances on his behalf in the temple. 

There were some photos of the Rome temple on the fence which showed what it will look like when completed.  It will be completed and open to tours in January/February 2019.

Since our train and flight out of Italy wasn't until Wednesday, we carried on with our plans and accommodation for Tuesday.  We did still get to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa, which is what Weston wanted to see in Italy. 

We stayed in La Spezia on Tuesday night and got to see some of Cinque Terre on Wednesday morning.  Beautiful area!  I'm glad we still got to have a peek at that part of Italy.  

We took a train to Venice on Wednesday afternoon and flew to Edinburgh.  Our flight got in nearly at midnight, so we stayed the night in Edinburgh on Wednesday.  We took a train to Durham on Thursday morning.  I dropped Alex off at the train station at 6:45am on Friday morning - he took a train to London and flew to Dallas on Friday.  

It was a pretty crazy week and a heartbreaking start to 2018!  Some painful memories, some cool places to see, some places we need to go back and see again (like Rome - if we can get past the memories associated with Rome.) Maybe one day we'll get a chance to go back to Italy.  I did toss a coin over my shoulder at the Trevi Fountain... but we're not ready to go back yet.  

Some day...but New Year's Eve in Rome goes down as one of the worst days of our lives.  

I think New Year's Eve may be a pretty hard thing to celebrate for a while, but we'll get through it.  This scripture came to mind:  

"Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning"  (Psalms 30:5) 

We'll probably have sad feelings on New Year's Eve, but we'll move forward with the hope and joy that the Savior and His resurrection brings.  However many nights of sorrow we may have, we know that there is hope and happiness ahead.