Ciao Italia!

January 31 - February 1

When we were still on our trip to Terceira, my good friend Travelzoo tempted us both with the opportunity to spend a week in Tuscany for just $499 each!  Airfare, car rental, 4 star hotel, and breakfast each morning all included.  Too good to resist, so we signed right up!  Although it is "winter" in Tuscany, that doesn't mean snow.  In fact one of our guides told us that it has snowed in this area only twice in the last 40 years!

I have never been to Italy, but Jeff has been here a couple of times on business, so he was very excited at the prospect of making a return trip.

The "deal" had us flying into Milano, renting a car, and then driving three and a half hours to the spa resort town of Montecatini Terme.

We drove to JFK in a snowstorm on Tuesday, January 31st.  We left early afternoon to allow plenty of time to get there, hoping to beat much of the storm - which we did.  We arrived at our park, fly, stay hotel (Fairfield Inn Kennedy Airport) at about 4:30 and shuttled over to the airport at 5 p.m.  I was graced by the "groin check" despite our TSA Precheck Status.  Mostly an annoyance (for both me and the young lady who had to conduct the groin check).  We found a nice Irish Pub place and had some drinks, soup, and sandwiches.  A good way to assuage hunger and pass the time.



We flew on Emirates Airlines in an Airbus 380, a gigantic plane with both upper and lower seating.  There is actually a full bar on the upper (first and business class) level!  We did not see it, being in "steerage" class ourselves.  That said, even the economy seats were more comfortable than most other airlines we have flown.

The plane took off a bit late due to a need for de-icing, but we were in the air and on our way at about 10:40 p.m.  We were determined to get some sleep as we knew we had a 3-4 hour drive facing us when we landed.  Jeff was more successful than I was in getting some sleep, but I did enjoy watching Bridget Jones' Baby as well as Me Before You -- both of which were quite entertaining.

Uneventful plane ride and a wild drive through the mountains under cloudy skies with occasional rain, and we arrived at our hotel, Hotel Minerva Palace at about 7 p.m. and faced a challenge of getting the car parked successfully.  After safely depositing our bags in our room and doing a bit of washing up, we walked around the corner to Da Lorenzo to find some dinner.  I regret not photographing our meals since they were both beautiful (che bella) and delicioso!  We shared an antipasta and then Jeff had a phenomenal tortellini stuffed with gorgonzola cheese and served with a pear cream sauce, while I had a delicious seafood risotto.  It was lemony and so, so good.  We shared a bottle of wonderful Chianti.
 

              

After dinner, we strolled back to the hotel, looking forward to a good long sleep.