Home. But not without trying really, really hard

We are home. It didn’t look like that was going to happen this morning in Milan. Yesterday we had a long, like really long, chat with Delta Airlines about how getting home would happen (see yesterday’s blog if you’re interested), and finally all three of us were booked on a flight from Milan to Amsterdam, to hook up with our connection home. 10:50 was our flight time. That turned out to be true for Mom, but alas, when we arrived at the airport at 8:10, to our great alarm, we discovered that George and I had been booked on the 6:40 AM to Amsterdam. KLM, Delta’s partner in crime, didn’t want to help us, so I booked it across the departures terminal to the literal other end to speak with a Delta rep. Poor Simona, the woman working the desk, already had two other parties in need of assistance, both with complex, overwhelming problems. So when I approached she seemed pretty distressed. So was I. And others around us. I was at the counter for about an hour before Simona, working one desk phone and two cell phones all at the same time, trying to fix problems, was able to re-ticket us. Mom’s knee was acting up. George was gimpy. I was just done with it all. Then our wheelchair assistance didn’t arrive and we had to walk the two miles to the gate (okay, not two miles, but it sure seemed like it). It took all of the three hours of time before our flight left to get to the gate. But at that point, I was just grateful to have a ride home. Our Amsterdam connection went smoothly, but I did have the misfortune of sitting next to a very old, very Eastern European woman with very pointy elbows, which she placed in my ribcage for almost 9 hours. Customs and taxis and rain and then finally! We are home. Got to see Alexander and hear his stories and also got to pet cats. Now, we will try to stay awake until about ten to reset the old clock. Signing off until next time, which is scheduled to be Peru in 2020! Thanks for traveling with us.

These are the Alps!

Wait! We wind up going to one more museum and then everything goes wrong until it doesn’t

Okay, you may want to put on your comfy pants and settle into an easy chair for this one. It’s been a long day. We were up early and out the door by 9, because we wanted to see one last musuem in Torino before bussing to our Milan airport hotel in the afternoon. There was plenty of time because our Airbnb hostess let us know we could stay as long as we wanted since she didn’t have another guest booked. So, we began the walk to the very cool National Museum of Cinema. Torino, the birthplace of Italian cinema,  does a great job of celebrating the craft with a multi-story, epic, musuem housed in a landmark building called the Mole Antonelliana. It was built in the mid-late 1800s and was originally a synagogue. Now, it’s believed to be the tallest musuem in the world (also it’s featured on the 2 cent Euro coin - how do you like these Wikipedia skills?). As soon as we paid for tickets, Mom and I took the panoramic elevator up to the top of the long spire at the center of the musuem. It’s a glass elevator and gives you views of the musuem all the way to the top, where you switch to views of the city. All of this was pretty fantastic and we took pictures, including our last selfie for this trip (see below). 

After our elevator ride, we three left the musuem for a short bit to grab breakfast. We lucked out big time because we happened to find this lovely little place called Tabata Creperie and Bistro. Recommended. For the first time since leaving France, mom (and the rest of us) had egg at breakfast. She’s an eggaholic so the brunch which offered eggs, pancakes, toast, bacon, coffee and fresh squeezed orange juice was just the ticket. Might as well eat like an American since we’re heading west tomorrow. George and I also tried the handmade hot chocolate and it was mighty fine, all thick and not too sweet. Our spirits were mighty high upon the completion of breakfast. Then we toured the musuem.

So this musuem is fantastic. There are amazing relics of not only Italian cinema, but also the film industry around the world, And a large portion of the musuem’s exhibits are on a circular pathway that leads up (and down) the round building’s side. We’ve grown accustomed to grabbing a wheel chair for George on these musuem days. He’s just lacking the stamina to get through a musuem at the pace Mom and I want to go, so it works out pretty good for everyone. Today, as I tried and failed to find the words in Italian for wheelchair, I instead, sat in the air and motioned with my hands like I was pushing myself with wheelchair wheels. That just confused everybody and made George crack up. Apparently, I don’t do a good impression of wheeling. Mom just pointed to the wheelchair sitting 10 feet from me (I would have thought of that eventually) and I handed over my passport to a stranger (as you do) and exchanged it for the chair.. George sat in it and then said to me “you have to do it”, and I thought he meant unlock a break or something, so I started to fiddle around with the side of the chair. Turns out, what he was saying was that I’d have to push because the wheel chair lacked wheels for the wheeler to push. So we teamed up for the visit and I learned what it’s like to have no one see you when you’re trying to navigate a musuem in a chair. Also, it was good strength training to push him up the multi-floor circular walkway. Maybe an hour into our musueming it became quite clear that we were all just done. Walking home happened and as soon as we arrived back, things became difficult.

Turns out the our lingering afternoon packing was not to be. The Airbnb had found a last minute guest and they wanted us out ASAP. Our first indicator was someone else’s stuff just inside the doorway. That was odd. So Mom checked her Airbnb account and discovered that while we were at the musuem our person was trying to reach us. So now we felt like interlopers. Quick packing was our game and I was winning until I received a text from Booking.com, unhooking me from our hotel in Milan. Cancelled reservation. Super rude. I had reserved the room months ago and got a pretty good deal, maybe $85 or something. I don’t actually know because the reservation was deleted off of my account. Turns out that my credit card was renumbered when the number was stolen a few months back and they wanted me to update it. They sent me an email, which I didn’t read because vacation and all that. So, when I didn’t update my card, the reservation went away. No biggie I thought. I’d just call the hotel and re-reserve. Only when I called they couldn’t help. They told me there was only one room available and it would be $295 Euro for the night. That was my room! But the hotel wouldn’t budge and so I entertained the idea of sleeping at the airport. Then we remembered that Mom had booked a separate room, so we were saved, paying an extra 40 Euro to bunk with her. George and I are her guests this evening. 

While I was trying to work out the hotel situation, the clock ticked down to our new exit time and before we could escape, the cleaning people arrived at the apartment, clearly pretty aggravated that we were still there. Believe me, I was pretty aggravated too. I didn’t want to be there as much as they didn’t want us there. Oh, and several days ago, the flusher fell off the wall and into the toilet. Long story. But, they seemed none too pleased, even though we’d reported it to the owner. The exiting from that apartment felt much like how one feels slinking out of a stranger’s house after a one night stand. We felt a bit disoriented, clothes were not in their proper places and there was the scent of cigarette smoke in the air (okay, that had nothing to do with the situation but it paints the picture, right? Also, Europeans tend to smoke. A lot). Taxi was found and our troubles were over as we headed to the bus station to catch a ride to the Milan airport, where we’d transfer to our airport hotel.

I’d purchased tickets for the 4PM bus but since we were hustled out of the apartment early, I asked the driver if we could jump on the 3PM. No problem! Until I made the horrifying discovery that I had accidentally purchased tickets for the 2PM bus. We’d missed the bus. There was a very nice Italian bus man who clearly saw my distress, as my eyes became a bit misty, and he reissued tickets for us and soon we were on our way. Whew. We had to change seats to avoid a very loud conversation happening in the row behind us, which was a big disappointment to the guy in the back who was trying to make out with his much younger girlfriend, even when she was sleeping. It was a lot of action back there and he didn’t want to be interrupted. Also, he decided to take a nap on the seats in the very back row, right behind George and me, laying prone across all five, with his feet in our direction. He folded his hands over his body like Dracula in his coffin and proceeded to snore his way through the misty rainy day. That was the bus, but what did we really expect?

We safely arrived at Milan’s airport and found the taxi stand pretty quickly, except the taxis wouldn’t drive us to our hotel. They were special taxies that only drove into Milan itself. Instead we had to travel to the other end of the arrival gate, take an elevator, cross the street to the Sheridan hotel (walking through it, with bags but with no intentions of staying there), out the door and to a local taxi stand. Once we got there, I was just fine paying the “standard fare” of 20 Euro to anywhere from the airport. Our taxi ride was maybe 5 minutes, but whatever. We really needed to be in our room (well, really Mom’s room). I give him a 50 Euro bill when we got to the hotel and he only gave me back 20, claiming that the ride was actually 30 Euro. Really guy? He did give in quickly and handed over another 10 after I gave him side eyes. 

And finally, in our hotel room, our trip for the day over, I took care of one last piece of business. We had tickets on Easy Jet in the morning to Amsterdam, where we’d connect with our Delta flight home. But a few months ago Delta changed the time of our flight from 5PM to 3:15PM, which I thought was no big deal until I figured out yesterday that Easy Jet would not let us take carry on luggage on the plane. That meant that when we arrived in Amsterdam, we’d have to leave the secure area of the airport, wait for our luggage, go through security again, and then get to our gate during what used to be an ample layover but was now very not. Easy Jet said no to gate checking our bags and cared not at all about our Delta problem (really why should they, well, maybe except to be nice, I guess). So I was pretty worried that we may miss our flight home. In a moment of desperation, I called Delta with this crazy idea that perhaps they’d fly us to Amsterdam instead, since their change put our connection at risk. I really didn’t have high hopes that this would happen, but I also wanted to know what our back up plan was if we were to miss the flight. Many many minutes of hold music was my immediate future, followed by a transfer or two. Then, supervisor Melodie clearly put the idea of a flight from Milan off the table. Then she said our only choice was to rebook our flight for Friday or for a different flight tomorrow that would take us through Atlanta and then to Minneapolis in the middle of the night. Alternately, we could buy a ticket from Milan to Amsterdam for $700 per person. Or we could be refunded our ticket price and find a different carrier to take us home. So those were some terrible options. We talked about protocol a lot and about how it wasn’t Delta’s fault we’d chosen to book with Easy Jet. When I asked what would happen if we tried to make the flight tomorrow but missed it, she told me we’d be facing a penalty to get rebooked. So I got off the phone with her and went to the restaurant to drink wine. Then, the most amazing thing happened. Melodie called me back and said that she’d talked to someone else and that they would change our tickets and fly us all the way from Milan to Minneapolis, with our expected layover in Amsterdam. What happened, Melodie? I thought you were not on our side, but all this time you were and were just hiding it. Now I love Melodie, who saved us a very stressful day tomorrow. She also saved my Delta friends from having to hear this story for years to come. 

Are you tired of listening to stories about our mishaps? Do you wonder how on earth I bought a 2PM ticket for a 4PM train? Is the water safe to drink at the Idea Hotel in Milan? And under what conditions, if any, are nuts allowed to be transported into the U.S.? Why am I asking you, my few and faithful readers, these questions? At this point, after 35 days of traveling, I don’t really know the answer to anything anymore. But, I will post one last time tomorrow when we are home, loving on our kitties and doing a whole lot of nothing.

From the Cinema Museum and also my face for most of the day

On top of the musuem

View of lovely Torino

This was when we were still able to smile

Cinema Musuem, outside 

Interior shot of walkways 

Spotted from the elevator

Fellini drawings

Bus Rain This was our day

Doing not much of anything and feeling pretty good about it - the long trip wind down

We did a lot of nothing today, aside from some delicious eating and an afternoon walk. This morning we descended on our favorite cafe in Torino, the great Bartelli and Milano. One again, I drank spiked bicerin, ate pastries, and admired the mirrored decor. And again, we left feeling very sugared and caffeinated. It’s our morning routine! We three spent a good portion of the day in the apartment, planning for the two days to come, in which we travel to Milan and then to Amsterdam and then to home. Less than 48 hours and we’ll be in Minneapolis. Hard to believe, sitting here in Italy, just home from a delicious meal of ravioli with mint, lemon and ricotta, white wine, and creme brûlée for dessert. Thursday night dinner will likely be a frozen pizza, I’m guessing. George ventured out on his own for about 1/2 hour today to find a gift for his Alex (not brother Alex (Bralex), but boyfriend Alex). It was his first real adventure on his own in Europe. And just in the nick of time! Mom and I also took a stroll and stopped at a cafe for gelato and coffee (my coffee was poured over vanilla gelato - still counts). And just mom and I went to dinner. In typical fashion, I got lost, somehow crossing over the street we live on to the opposite side of our neighborhood than the restaurant we were going to. I don’t quite know how I get along in the world and travel as much as I do without having any sense of direction at all. I need compass implanted the way others need a pacemaker. Seriously. We may visit a musuem tomorrow before leaving for Milan and we may not. It’ll be a surprise!

This is my favorite. A mortician called Odd One. 

Came across a WWII monument in a local park

The building spell something, I think

Found this delightful building on our walk

And it had a courtyard

Fancy flag street

Just your regular old pharmacy

This lovely building

This was made to honor a pope

Beautiful Torino

Typical pedestrian street

Our street XX Settembre

What we look like when we’re doing nothing

Torino. Tuesday night.

Dinner spot

Three little museums involving human anatomy, criminology and, of course, fruit make our day weird

We all slept in today, which was much needed. After over 30 days of non-stop touring, a body tends to get worn down, and that’s where we all seemed to be today. So, our late start was well earned. We began as we have every day in Torino, at a cafe eating goodies and drinking coffee and bicerin. We tried a new place today and it just wasn’t the same. But, really, we’re in Torino, eating at some of the best cafes in the world, so who are we to judge?

Our day was built around three museums, all part of the University of Torino. They were all quite old, housing collections mainly from the 19th century. Our first was the Musuem of Human Anatomy. No photos were allowed at this location, so the pictures I have below were taken from the internet. This musuem was quite like the Vrolik, which we saw in Amsterdam, one month ago. The musuem had examples of human anatomy, mostly skeletal. Some, however, were preserved or mummified objects. And, there were several interesting wax models of everything from the anatomy of the eye to the stages of fetal development. The back portion of the one-room musuem was dedicated to brain specimens. There were hundreds and hundreds of them, in several glass display cases. And on the opposite side, were examples of skulls and even death masks. George is doing a project on the history of medicine for school and these museums we’ve visited on this trip are fantastic exposure for him.

The next musuem we visited was dedicated to one man’s vision and corresponding collection of the anthropology of criminality. The Cesare Lombroso Musuem of Criminal Anthropology was a fascinating and disturbing. Lombroso lived at the end of the 19th and early 20th century and in his studies of criminals led to some strange conclusions. He equated the number and types of tattoos with a predisposition for deviant behavior. Also, in the dissection of the skulls of deceased criminals, he concluded that the shape of the skull can also determine criminality. So that’s a bunch of nonsense. But, the collection he amassed included hundreds of skulls that he studied (one of which - very creepily - had the word prostitute written on it) as well as equipment he used to analyze criminality. Also, he amassed a large collection of death masks of deceased prisoners, marked with their names and prison number on them. There was also some incredible artwork made by both prisoners and people committed to insane asylums. George commented that he’d have been deemed either a criminal or insane by Lombroso. No photos were permitted in this museum either, so pictures below are again from our friend Google.

The last musuem of our day, the beautifully titled Museo Della Frutta, housed the collection of models of fruit created by Francesco Garnier Valletti. He was a fruit fanatic for sure and being in a room full of every possible type of apple, recreated in wax, was pretty incredible. Also, the red labels made me very happy. Numbered fruit models with little name tags, all arranged next to each other on display shelves equals musuem heaven. Thank you Museo Della Frutta!

Taxied home. Watched Cars with George. Slept. Woke up. Fed the masses. Watched Anchorman. Wrote blog. That about sums up the rest of the day (and this abbreviated ending is an indicator of my level of sleepiness). Our last day in this amazing city is tomorrow. And we are home on Thursday!

Anatomy musuem

Gallery

Infant skulls on display

Slides of brain dissection

Anthropology of Criminality

These are water jugs that prisoners carved into with decorations and words

Collection of skulls used in Lombardo’s studies of criminals

Up close

Death mask

Strange apparatus for studying criminal skulls

Examples of playing cards made by prisoners

A woman locked up in an insane asylum created thousands of paper cranes - beautiful

Modus Operandi

So many apples!

Beauties

Number 223

Number 836

Fruit sculpture

This was outside the musuem

Accidental and on purpose day drinking, dodging human hordes at the Egyptian Museum and the loudest park in the world

I started the day with a bit of alcohol, which was very unusual, almost unheard of for me. At the cafe this morning I decided to try a little of the spiked bicerin with my breakfast pastry. It was good and left me with a relaxed sensibility on our way to stop one of our day. Torino has the largest collection of Egyptian artifacts outside of Egypt, and they are all housed in the appropriately called Egyptian Musuem. That was our destination after breakfast. We were able to get there pretty early (before 11) because the three of us learned from the out-of-stock pastries yesterday that breakfast must begin at sunrise (well not sunrise - more like 9AM, but it felt like sunrise for some of us). When we arrived at the musuem, we stood in a short line to get in and then, judging by the ground floor crowds, decided to head to the top floor and work our way down. Crowd management, folks. Except our plans were foiled when we got to the top and learned that we’re not so clever. Many large tour groups and other stragglers were already up there, beating us at our own game. Too crowded was our sad determination of the museum so we planned to leave. But before we departed, all of us agreed to try the first floor where the mummies were. Imagine our surprise to find almost no one there. I think folks either started on top or on bottom, and in between was exactly the right place for us to be. Museuming saved, we had an excellent time touring, but there was the knowledge in the back of my mind that soon, very soon, the hordes would arrive, either from the top or the bottom - or worse yet - both. There was no time for lollygagging, and so mummies were viewed, odd pictures were taken, and then we ran for the cafe, another hiding place from fellow tourists. 

We settled in to get more coffee into Mom (she really doesn’t run well without it) and George and I picked out Fanta. Mmmm European Fanta. So good. Right next to the Fanta was another orange drink that I’d never seen before called Crodino. I picked that up as well to try it out. The server poured it into a whisky glass, which made my pretty sure I had just purchased liquor at 11:30 AM. Sure enough, when I drank it, it tasted very much like alcohol, and until I looked the drink up just now to write about it, I thought I’d been day drinking. Turns out Crodino is a non-alcoholic aperitif. So all of the tipsiness I felt early on in my day was from breakfast, where all tipsiness should originate, in my opinion. Fanta, Crodino and Macchiato. The Egyptian Museum’s finest. 

After a quick finish-up in Egypt, our plan was to head over the the Natural Sciences Musuem, about 5 blocks away. The walk was pleasant and we saw sights. Google said the musuem opened at 10. And the guide map provided by the friendly folks at the Torino Tourist Info Center listed it under museums that we could get into with our passes. So, imagine our surprise when the place was very, very closed, like hasn’t been open in months (years?) closed. That was not good news, especially because both Mom and George were needing a rest. Good thing we found a park across the street. There was a very entertaining dog playing fetch with gusto, which was as close to natural history (well, not history, but the dog did seem pretty natural) that we got for the day. Next, we needed to Uber back to the apartment to drop George off and also sit on couches for enough time to recover from our odd morning. Guess what? Almost all of Italy doesn’t have Uber, including Torino. Luck was on our side, though, because there was a hospital in our general vicinity that had a taxi stand. Problems solved for the day, we got home, rested our cares away, and then came up with a new plan for the back half of our day.

George opted to stay home (which was a good choice at the time and also in retrospect) and Mom and I jumped in another taxi, easily found at a stand by the Piazza Castello, and went to find the Borgo Medieval Village and Castle. This place is sort of strange. It’s old, but not Medieval old. It was built in 1884 for the Italian General Exhibition and remains an attraction to this day. Our cab driver dropped us off in front of Parco Valentino, within which the village is located. But what we saw when we exited was a huge sign inviting us to OCTOBERFEST. German drinking music (is that a genre?) was playing and folks were getting rowdy. We could have opted for more day drinking, but instead, we pushed through the crowds and down a hill to our destination. Our next loud, weird obstacle came in the form of an announcer for what we think was the half-marathon happening in the city today. He was counting down - tre, due, uno! - and then something we couldn’t see would happen and he’d comment. In between whatever was going on, the guy graciously played death metal for the peaceful park goers at a volume that I’m pretty sure is illegal in most countries. I remember looking at a map of Parco Valentino before leaving on our so far pretty lousy excursion, and it seemed so tranquil, with fountains and riverfront views. Not so. The noise fest diminished a bit when we did finally find the fake but still old village. I gotta say, though, Torino is the loudest city in the world. Everyone must be deaf by age 40. 

Medieval village was quaint and charming and we enjoyed the shops and the sights. After a bit of touring, we settled in for some river watching and cheese sampling at the local Medieval cafe. This was the tranquility we were so desperate to find, and it was good. We lingered for a long time, and then waited some more when our server forgot to bring us the bill, so by the time we were done, it was close to 4:30. Just across the way there was a ticket booth for something but since we’d been touring the village most of the afternoon, we couldn’t figure out what we may need tickets for. So, as you do in a foreign country where no one speaks your language, we just picked up some tickets and let the employees lead us to our next adventure. Turns out we were hustled up a pretty steep hill, encouraged by the woman that the top to keep going, don’t stop for pictures, get on up that hill. As soon as we were at the top, she shut a barricade behind us and we began a tour of the fake Medieval castle, presented in Italian. It was actually the best tour I’d had the misfortune of being part of this whole trip. For a tour hater, I appreciated the succinct explanations of the castle rooms and the relatively small group of people. Still don’t know much about the castle though on account of the Italian language part. It’s hard, because I can read Italian relatively well, can speak enough to get by, but listening to it being spoken is tricky. Pretty quickly after the accidental tour, Mom and I decided to leave. Then I remembered that no Uber was coming to our rescue. We figured there’d be a taxi stand at OKTOBERFEST, so we climbed the hill, past the death metal music guy, who was now hosting a skateboarding competition, and to the top, where the very loud, very old-timey German music was playing. And pretty quickly we found that taxi stand. With one empty taxi and no one around. I fiddled with some apps and tried looking up the best ways to get a taxi in Torino until I finally resorted to calling a company. The dispatcher spoke no English, but I was up for the challenge and managed to describe where we were in the park. Pronto taxi was on its way. Prego! 

We arrived home pretty wiped out and nearly deaf. Many restaurants are closed on Sundays we’ve discovered, so George and I walked across the street to the Chinese restaurant. The menu was odd but I was thankful that there were English descriptions of the food. Previously, I’d been checking out the menu online, and it was in Italian only. Trying to decipher Chinese food descriptions in Italian hurt my brain. I wound up eating deep fried artichoke and grilled tofu. It was meh. But I didn’t care, because it was quiet in our part of town and peaceful in our apartment. We’re all getting pretty exhausted and I think we’ll be ready to head home on Thursday. 

Breakfast, good morning everybody!

Egyptian Museum

When we found the quiet first floor

We very much miss our cats

Mummy

These cool paintings

This lonely foot

These guys

Love this one

Bird for Eli

This is amazing and beautiful

Decay

Stunner

Exhibit hall

Another

Crodino!

Looks peaceful, right?

Trickery!

Fake but old Medieval village

Pretty lovely

Quiet finally

Excellent details

View of the river from the cafe

Enjoying a break

Oops! We’re on a castle tour.

Castle stuff

This is a toilet

Dungeon

Castle window

More castle

Lined up

Our Italian Chinese restaurant