“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” – Lao Tzu
It was a long journey to get to Florence. I took a flight from Kansas City to Chicago, Chicago to Copenhagen, and finally Copenhagen to Florence.
Thankfully, my row on the long overnight flight had two empty seats next to me so I put on my sleeping mask, wrapped up in a blanket and was out cold for about four or five hours of the flight.
Once we landed in Copenhagen I needed to go through customs and the line was extremely long…probably a two hour wait and my layover was only one hour and a half. This caused stress that I did not need or want. I had to remind myself that this trip and experience is meant to be, so in some Divine way it will all work out. The line was mixed with people needing to make connecting flights and others who had arrived at their final destination – not a good system for the people connecting. Noticing my slight panic, a few people near me encouraged me to jump the line all the way to the front to ensure I would catch my connecting flight. Another passenger informed me that my gate was located the farthest away from customs. Yikes! So I crawled under the stanchion rope and cut to the front. I told myself to keep moving forward and don’t look back…I didn’t want the eye rolls and loud sighs to distract from the goal of getting to Florence. I don’t normally do things like this and it felt very uncomfortable but desperate times call for desperate measures, people! Apologies to those couple of hundred or so people I cut in front of. Thankfully, when I got to the front of the line, people were more than understanding to let me in. Whew. I hate confrontation.
It appeared the male customs officer behind the glass checking passports was doing some sort of training because there was a female customs officer giving him instructions. After reviewing the stamps in my passport, I assume he noticed I had just been in Europe 92 days ago, he asked why I was going to Florence. I responded, “I’m dating an Italian man.” The woman shrieked with excitement and squealed, “well, let her in immediately!” I laughed and said, “yes, I haven’t seen him in three months.” To which he said, “no wonder you’re in a rush.” He pushed down the heavy looking & sounding metal stamper & stamped my passport next to the stamp from July. The woman asked if I was flying out of gate A23 and I nodded yes. He chimes in and said, “you better run, your gate is all the way at the end. At least a 15-20 min walk. Hurry or you won’t make it!”
And that folks is how you get through customs quickly. It was beshert!
Thankfully, I didn’t have to go through security again like I did in Chicago or recheck my bag which I’ve had to do before otherwise this story would not have had a happy ending. So I’m taking it as a sign that I’m off to a good start on this adventure.
I arrived in Florence about 5pm local time to a warm welcome from Luca…videotaping me as I exited the airport terminal with my huge bags. 🤦♀️ 17 hours of traveling does not make for a cute photo let alone a video. But it’s sweet he wanted to capture the moment. ❤️
(Quick recap for those of you who are new to the blog – Luca and I met in the summer of 2021 hiking across Spain on the El Camino de Santiago – a 500 mile pilgrimage.)
Before I arrived, Luca bought me a bike and a new bike lock. I mean come on…how sweet is this gesture? Nobody has ever bought me a bike before.
Since he lives outside of the city center now, he wanted to make sure I had transportation other than riding the tram that cost €1.50 per ride. Very thoughtful. But…a day or two before I arrived he made a deal to trade it with someone who had a bike that he used to ride. Confusing, I know. Apparently, bike theft is an issue in Florence (and probably Italy in general if we are realistic about it). Luca had this particular bike for seven years and then it “went missing” two years ago and some guy named Giovanni found it “somewhere” within the last two years. Luca saw it parked on the street, waited for the guy to show up and asked about doing a trade. Giovanni was good with the deal…which involved swapping the seats (Luca had a nice gel seat he wanted to keep – he is a master negotiator – I’m assuming that is another Italian trait). So I was able to ride “my” bike once to the city center before the trade happened. It was a cute bike but now some random dude has it and I have Luca’s old bike from two years ago that he loves. Very random…and very Luca. 🚲
Luca now rides an electric bike. Monday, on our first ride together into the city center, he placed his hand on the back of my shoulder blade and pushed me as we went wizzing through the outskirts of town, over a bridge of the Arno River, through the park and into the city. It was fun and terrifying all at the same time. Luca is very comfortable on the bike. He zips between cars, people, scooters and other cyclists. He has no fear, the man will eat and entire pizza while riding hands free for goodness sake, and I am left in the dust pedaling slowly like a granny and being overly cautious. Just my speed.
My friend Sybil from New York City came to visit! She arrived yesterday. She has been in France & Italy for a family function the last couple of weeks. She is going to stay with us for about a week before heading home. I haven’t seen here since I was in NYC almost a year ago so it’s been good to catch up.
Today Sybil and I went by to see my friend Simone (I’ve written about him before, here). It was good to catch up and he told me he and his wife found out that they are having another baby boy in February. 💙 Simone is one of just a couple of friends I’ve made in Florence so far and being a collector or people, it was really good to see a local familiar face.
Luca and I took Sybil to Sophia Loren’s restaurant for some authentic pizza. It’s still the best pizza in Florence.
I saw some newlyweds taking their wedding photos by the carousel in the Piazza della Repubblica while I was writing this update. I chose this spot because I used to sit here daily and write in my journal. It is just below the apartment I rented a year ago…today it felt comfortable to be back were it felt familiar while writing to all of you.
Goodnight and much love from Florence. 🇮🇹
