Recipe: Tuscany 2006 Journal Entry #2-Arrival Day

Tuesday & Wednesday, March 21st & 22nd

What can we say about yesterday and today? Where to start? .I've been awake now for 29 hours .

We awoke Tuesday morning in New York and headed for the American Museum of Natural History via a bus that took us through Central Park. We went there to see the butterflies at the Butterfly Conservatory. We bought tickets for the 11am viewing and then wandered around the rest of the museum, marveling at the immense whale, the brontosaurus skeleton and many of the amazing things they have there. The coat check here was $2, the one at the Met was free. The butterflies were awesome! We walked into the doubled-doored enclosure (vivarium) to find hundreds of butterflies flitting around us or just hanging out on the plant life. It was a very humid 80 degrees F. in the vivarium but I think I could have stayed the whole day! DH took some amazing pictures with our new camera. There were a few butterflies as large as my hand! The colors of some were breathtaking.



After the museum we stopped at Annie's for lunch. Wonderful food and service. DH had an iceberg lettuce wedge with blue cheese, bacon, scallions, tomatoes and ranch dressing. It was very yummy. I had a bowl of roast mushroom & barley soup and we split the most wonderful, crispy side of tiny French fries.

We met our driver in the lobby of the apartment and headed for the airport. We are able to change DH' seat to a bulkhead seat. I'll be right behind him. We realize we left the battery charger for the new camera plugged into the wall in the NY apartment so I phone our NY host and she says she will send it to our home for us.

On the plane neither of our monitors works well. I was looking forward to wiling away the hours watching movies, bummer. Dinner on the plane not bad, pot roast for DH and baked halibut for me with mushroom sauce. Chilled green beans with a slice of Prosciutto, Gouda and a good hard roll. Fruit cup for dessert.

DH was able to sleep for a bit off and on. Spent a lot of time standing along with other passengers.

Two babies with a Mom next to us. She's working on 25 hours with no sleep at this point. The airline supplies cribs that hook to the bulkhead. One is a very active child who didn't sleep at all. Cute though and Mom very patient though obviously very exhausted.

When we land in Milan, I ask the man next to me if he is home now. He says no, he lives in Pisa and we realize we on the same connecting flight. He sees me perusing the airline magazine map of the airport and he tells us to just follow him, it's easy. An angel in disguise!

We exit the plane to the tarmac in pea soup-like fog. The Mom with the two children is struggling down the metal stairs with two babies and strollers. People rush to help her.

The line for American document check is long, but our, "Pisa angel", is waiting on the other side for us. Unfortunately, he is waiting for us in front of a monitor where all the flights are scrolling, "CANCELLED". He goes on to the gate to wait out the weather. We get in line at an info desk. When we reach the front the information officer tells us to go up to the next level to another information booth. We go upstairs to that one and get in line. When we get to the front of that one we are told to go back downstairs, retrieve our luggage and go to a third information booth to find out where to catch the bus to Pisa which is leaving in 1/2 hour.

We go back downstairs and find 3 of our 4checked bags. Then DH searches the piles of luggage that have been pulled off the belt. There it is!

Now lugging our luggage, we go back up some more stairs to the third information booth. This information booth closed. When someone does show up they don't know what we are talking about when we ask about the bus to Pisa. We ask at Alitalia and are told to get in a different Alitalia line, the one over there .the one that is very, very long. DH gets in the line with our luggage and I go off to buy a phone card to call our Untour contact in Florence. She is the same one from two years ago. After an hour the line DH is in has not moved an inch and I am still having trouble with the phone card and finding an available pay phone. DH gets out of line to try calling one more time, we decide if that doesn't work we will rent a car. (Wonder what the lines at AVIS look like?) At least we are in Italy and are familiar with driving here. Last trip we flew thru France, this time we are least in the same country.

DH gets on the phone and I hear the beautiful words "Harriet .this is DH "! Yippee! She tells DH to go out to the curb to see if we can find the bus to Pisa. Off we go, with the gracious help of several Italians as to how to reach the curb. Once there we start asking ."are you going to Pisa by bus?" Eventually we find a small group, including an Alitalia pilot and our "Pisa angel". They are waiting for a bus to show up, more people in the same boat (bus) join us. Then .a bus!!! A woman takes our Pisa flight boarding passes as we board and we settle down for a 4-hour ride to Pisa. Only one couple (American) is acting ugly. They are having a domestic dispute about who's fault this all is while boarding and being nasty to everyone, coordinators and tourists alike. We pray they aren't Untourists!

After a couple miles our Pisa angel loans us his cell phone and DH calls our Untour contact again to let her know we are on our way. She tells us our car rental in Siena has been changed to Pisa and instructions await us at the Avis desk there. She asks DH to stand up and ask if anyone else is with Untours on the bus and if so, tell them the same thing. DH decides to wait a while until the ugly acting couple settles down. He tries to pay our angel from Pisa for the phone use and he won't hear of it. An angel indeed.

About two hours into the bus ride, an Italian man approaches the driver and they have a short conversation. Soon after, the bus pulls into an Autogrill (kind of a truck stop). We gratefully use the restrooms and DH and I share a delicious sandwich, though I forget the Italian word for hot is caldo so when the server asks me if that's how I want it I say no. Still tastes wonderful though! Back on the bus DH asks everyone if there are any other Untourists aboard. Nope.

DH sleeps quite a bit during the ride, for which I'm grateful because we are now on the same road we took to and from Venice and it's quite twisty turny, along with the fog still being very thick. The driver does a good job though.

We pull into the Pisa airport and there is Alessandra! We know her by sight as Untours sent us paperwork with her picture on it. She is indeed a sight for sore (and tired) eyes!
She is very happy to see us and takes us to AVIS and we sign up for the rental car. Then we are off to our apartment. DH is such a great driver, no matter where we are. I navigate between short snoozes. Not one missed turn the whole way! We are hurrying to get to the apartment before dark, as though we have been there before, we're not sure we will remember. In Buonconvento we stop at the COOP, (the grocery chain we don't normally use, preferring the smaller Mom & Pop operations,) to pick up a few things. When we arrive at the apartment our hosts have left enough stuff for us for a meal or two. Even decaf coffee for me! A bottle of wine, some salami, some cheese, butter, milk, a loaf of bread and a variety of fresh fruit. So now we have two bottles of wine and two packages of decaf but no oatmeal as I couldn't locate any at the COOP.

Our property is called Le Chiuse (pronounced Le Quise), our apartment is L'origano. Our host Nicolo, meets us with two glasses of his Brunello wine and says, "Welcome to Tuscany!" Welcome indeed!

We noticed on the drive that things are a bit more in bloom than the last time we arrived in Tuscany. Some kind of fruit tree with gorgeous pink blooms dots the landscape. There are two cats on the property, one a black and white and the other a striped brown and black. It will be nice to have cats around again.

I make a quick supper while DH starts a small fire in the fireplace. A fried egg sandwich for DH with Prosciutto, cheese and tomato. I have the same minus the egg There is a knock at the door and Harriet is standing there when we open it! It's so good to see her! She is full of apologizes for our troubles in Milan, we tell her she's not in charge of the weather! Then we are off to bed. The Butterfly Conservatory seems like it was days ago . DH sets the alarm so we won't miss orientation, but it goes off at 1 am and we are awake until 3 reading. Oh well, we're in Tuscany! We finally nod off again and sleep until 9 am. Almost late for orientation!