Italy: an Adventure to Remember
In 2011, after years and years of buildup and much anticipation, I finally went to Italy for the first time. My then boyfriend had been captivated by the beauty of a small Tuscan town called San Gimignano. Naturally, I couldn’t wait to visit.
He was right; San Gimi was simply beautiful.
It is a lovely little town built within what looks like a medieval castle, up on the hills in Tuscany. As soon as I stepped in, I thought of two things: Christmas and a fairy tale. When you first see that town… It took my breath away. It looked like it was taken out of a Disney movie. I know I hadn’t seen much of Europe yet, but it was just so…beautiful. Summertime — probably the time when more people vacation in San Giminagno — must be heavenly, surrounded by sunflowers and beautiful landscapes. Not like in November; it was freezing.
Getting there, though — and especially getting out — wasn’t all THAT pleasant, which is why this trip was an adventure to remember. (I’ll get to that later.)
Arriving in Italy
We arrived in Roma on the 24th (Thanksgiving Day in the US) and headed to our hotel on the outskirts of the city for the first night. Otherwise, it would’ve been a long late-night trip — 3 hours to Siena by train and then almost another hour to San Gimignano. Our taxi driver got a little lost on the way to the hotel and, to make matters worse, charged us 50 euros for the airport trip, as if it were our fault that he got lost. (If only I knew then what I know now…) That kind of ruined our schedule, enthusiasm and energy level. So, we decided not to go to the city center that night. Remember, it was Thanksgiving for us, so we had our Thanksgiving dinner at the hotel’s restaurant! There was no turkey, but there was plenty of prosecco. ;- ) It is safe to say that we had a decent time.
Getting to San Gimignano
The next morning, we skipped center Rome again and headed straight for San Gimi. I was so glad we did. Transportation in Italy didn’t seem to be very straightforward. The language wasn’t so much of a problem for me; I could understand enough to get us by and I could speak some broken Italian. Besides, unlike small towns in Spain (where I was living when I visited Italy), a lot more people could speak English. But, yeah…going back to the transportation system — it was problematic.
Nevertheless, we managed to buy our tickets and make it to our destinations: Rome to Florence, Florence to Siena (Poggibonsi), and finally, San Gimignano. We didn’t feel like waiting another hour for the bus at Poggibonsi, so we took a taxi. This time the taxi ride was better and the driver knew where he was going. Score!
We stayed at an Airbnb apartment inside the big castle, as I like to call it, for a relatively cheap nightly rate, considering how expensive everything was in San Gimi. Oh yeah, it is an expensive little town. Worth it, though. The view from our apartment was stunning. If I could wake up to that view every morning…I don’t know what it would be good for, but I’d be inspired at least. Tuscany is breathtaking.
After one night in San Gimignano, we realized that you don’t really need to stay there for more than two nights — it is possible to see and do almost everything in just one day! I’d say two days maximum. I thought, three to four days (or more) in San Gimignano is something that people of “certain age” would probably enjoy more, especially during off-season. Man, it was QUIET up there.
We went out to eat really late on the first night, perhaps thinking we were still in Spain, and dinner almost didn’t happen. Thankfully, we found a good restaurant open until late. After dinner, there was not much to do. Actually, I’ll rephrase that; there was nothing to do…except go for a walk. So we did just that. The town was just as beautiful at nighttime, maybe even better with all the lights. We enjoyed the walk.
Leaving San Gimignano
We had planned to stay until Sunday (three nights), but we cut it short because:
1) We had already seen everything there was to see in San Gimignano;
2) We had an early Monday morning flight, and by that point we did not trust the transportation system.
Once again, I was so glad we did. This is when it gets fun.
Our outbound flight was out of Pisa (a shorter distance than Rome), but we still needed to make sure that we’d be able to get train tickets on time. So, on Sunday, we said good-bye to San Gimi at around 11:00 AM, only to find ourselves still waiting for the bus outside the castle at 2:00 PM. It’s OK — we killed some time by taking pictures and what not. The bus finally arrived, but the driver didn’t have any more biglietti (bus tickets), which I still don’t understand how that worked, but we got a free bus ride to Poggibonsi.
We thought the long wait was probably due to it being Sunday and that it was the longest we’d have to wait, but then we got to Poggibonsi train station.
As I finished paying for one train ticket on the machine, two old men (whom I’ll call “angels” for this purpose), realizing that we were foreigners who didn’t know what was going on, approached us with urgency and said, “No, no biglietti…il treno viene soppresso!” They were telling me not to buy tickets, I got that. But, soppresso? I wondered. That’s one Italian word I had not heard before (among many others, of course) and I guess Google Translate wasn’t my thing back then. One of the angels then pointed at the screen, making that sign with a finger to his throat — the universally-known indication that something is “dead” or about to be. That’s when I knew our train wasn’t coming.
Getting to Pisa
I looked at the screen once again and almost every single train was soppresso (cancelled). I wasn’t so sure of what was happening. All I knew was that we needed to go to Florence and there wasn’t one train going there. The two angels kept trying to help me figure out how the heck we were going to get to Pisa. After an hour wait or so, a two-story high bus pulled up. It might have been regular transportation, I’ll never know. But as I stared out of a glass door, I saw the last two people in line get on the bus and I think I knew they were going to Florence. I didn’t have much time to go ask the driver if it was going to Florence. So I quickly asked the angels, “Firenze?” And they responded, “Si, questo bus va a Firenze…diretta.” A non-stop bus to Florence!
I ran as quickly as I could and verified with the driver if it was the bus to Firenze. He confirmed it and we got on. I was getting ready to pay the driver when he gestured that there was no need. I thought that maybe he was going to charge us later, but when we got to Florence, one hour later, he didn’t. Did we get TWO free bus rides that day? I think we did!
Anyway, originally we didn’t really need to go to Florence. However, since one of the main train stations is in Florence, we knew we could easily catch any train going to Empoli (the station where we needed to exchange trains for Pisa). Or so we thought.
A customer service rep informed us that there was a strike and that’s why most trains and buses weren’t running. We got lucky that our train was just leaving Florence when we got there, but when we got to Empoli, we ran out of luck: we waited for the longest time.
By the way, the train ride from Florence to Empoli was free, as well. That’s THREE free rides! We didn’t really plan it, but the train was leaving and we thought we could pay cash inside, like they do on many trains in Europe. I boarded the train with the wrong ticket (the one I bought in Poggibonsi for 5,90 euros) and my then boyfriend didn’t even have one. When an agent came around, I flashed some cash and my ticket and explained what happened. He said that it normally shouldn’t happen, but that he was going to accept the ticket. He stamped it and didn’t take any extra money. Basically, we traveled our whole trajectory free of charge. Score!
We arrived in Empoli at a decent time. We really thought we’d make it to Pisa in daylight, with enough time to see the leaning tower. But we soon faced reality. When I looked at the screen, every train we could possibly take was cancelled.
By then, we were really tired. We thought about all the possibilities. I mean, we had lucked out so far, so we could still get out of there, right? Maybe a bus would pull up again, who knows. We thought about just getting a hotel room in Empoli and leaving in the morning. We contemplated the whole picture, literally and figuratively.
I saw this hotel across the train station and thought maybe someone there spoke English or Spanish and could tell me how to get to Pisa otherwise. I walked inside and asked the old man at the front desk if he knew of any bus going to the airport. He gave me a strange look, as if thinking, “there’s no such thing.” Then he said, in all Italian, that there were so many trains going to Pisa it was hard to believe they were all cancelled. (Oh and, through that whole ordeal, I also realized I knew more Italian than I’d thought!)
Thinking about what the old man said, we headed back to the station. We looked at the screen again because, according to him, there had to be a train going to Pisa. And indeed, there was one. Hallelujah! The train to Grosseto, Italy, was leaving in another hour (we’d already been waiting for two or so), so what was another hour?! We sat at the cafeteria next door, had a snack and a much needed drink, and just hoped that this goshdarn train wasn’t going to get cancelled, too.
So far, it was all unbelievable. But we continued to wait…
The amazing thing is that none of us panicked. We were tired, but determined. I know that other tourists in the same situation would have probably freaked out and paid hundreds of euros for a taxi to get them out of there. I don’t know why we were so calm, but I imagine that being stranded in a country where you barely speak the language (or don’t speak it at all) is no fun. It can be frightening; it just wasn’t for us.
Despite this hard-to-believe adventure, I enjoyed myself my first time in Italy. I loved practicing the language and listening to native speakers. Italian is my favorite language, after all. I also loved the food. But I just hoped that the next time I visited there weren’t going to be any transportation strikes. (Fast-forward, I’ve been back a few more times since and no strikes!)
Getting to Madrid, Spain
We did make it to Pisa that night. We booked a hotel room and just stayed as close to the airport as we could. Ha ha! It felt like the longest, most exhausting day of my life, but we still had some energy to eat. We had a delicious, authentic (duh) Italian dinner and some good wine…just what we needed to end this quest.
In the morning, we took a cab to Pisa airport, which was less than ten minutes away. Everything went well.
Two hours later, we made it to Madrid Barajas airport. Of course, we still needed to get to Madrid center station and from there take another train to Ciudad Real, in Castilla La-Mancha. Just two more trains — 78 more minutes (combined) — and we’d officially end that wild weekend.
I wrote about this journey as soon as I got back so I wouldn’t forget. I am convinced: you need to take as many pictures as possible and keep a journal because memories fade! Plus, it may surprise you how much you took for granted when you were dumb and younger, and you want to make sure you don’t repeat that. :- )
This for me will definitely be one to remember.
