Our cruise ended in Mote Carlo. It’s 50 miles to the nearest airport. There are few taxis. The cruise line charges a lot for a bus ride to the airport. We decided to hire a tour guide to show us the sights and drop us at the airport. It worked very well, Pierre knew all the places to go and all the things to see: Monte Carlo, old town Monte Carlo, Monte Carlo from above, old town St. Paul de Vence, and another old town whose name I don’t remember.
The flight to Rome was uneventful, but the ride to the hotel was “interesting”. Our driver was a nice guy and extremely helpful, but it was dark out and he drove like a demon. When we got to the narrow cobble stone streets in downtown Rome, he didn’t bother slowing down. Our hotel’s reception desk closes at 5 PM, We had registered online and received a link, but it wasn’t obvious how we were going to get in the front door. While he was driving, the driver called the Anna, the hotel receptionist, at home. He handed me his Bluetooth headset, and turned the radio on.It was lovely music, but quite hard to hear Anna. I went through the entry process twice, but it each time I asked a question it got more complicated and I heard less of what Anna said. I finally gave the headset to Danita so she could hear part of what Anna had to say.
Our hotel is in a pedestrian-only area, so we had to stop a couple of blocks away. The driver led us down more cobble stone streets, wheeling our suitcases behind us. When we got to the hotel, we turned on phones, clicked the links, and pressed buttons on websites. Amazingly, the door buzzed and we were in. We were to proceed to the third floor. We walked up stairs and found an area labeled “3A 3B 3C”, which had nothing to do with our hotel. We went up at least two more flights of stairs and found a locked door with our hotel’s name on it. More phones, links, website buttons, and the door unlocked! Our rooms are clean and modern, but it’s not easy to upgrade very old buildings to modern accommodations. Our room has lights hung from wires draped from the ceiling, some 15 feet above our heads. The woodwork for the floor above is exposed. We see a massive wood beam going across our ceiling. Everybody was very kind. It’s all quite different and interesting. But we were exhausted and went straight to bed.
