Getting There

 ERICA On Tuesday, June 14, 2011, the Thompson family embarked on our adventure to Europe. We started off the crazy day finishing up the leftovers on the packing list, dropping off our black Morkie, Devo, and finally checking in at the San Francisco International Airport. Once we had checked in, and gone through security, we waited for our flight for San Diego. After we all happily got off the Virgin America aircraft into the San Diego airport, we were forced to endure a six hour wait for our next flight to London...in which we decided to go to Belmont Park, a theme park! My brother, Cy, and I rode various rides, most of them consisting of rides that make you dizzy.

                                                               

  After the rides, we all took a nice, relaxing walk along the water, and stopped for our last bite of frozen yogurt and ice cream before plunging into the luxurious world of gelato! When we arrived back at the park, we found our taxi waiting to take us back to the airport. When we went through the baggage check-in, and security, we then waited half an hour for our next flight to London, in which my dad, Doug, read The Agony and the Ecstasy, my mom, Nina, got some last minute work in, and I read The Hunger Games to Cy. We then got on the British Airways aircraft where we then started our ten hour flight. Luckily, our family (especially Cy and I) were well entertained by the individual touch screen TVs, where I watched True Grit! We all fell into a dreamless sleep, like most people did on the plane, where we woke up six hours later to find a small breakfast waiting for us on our tray tables. At the end of our flight, we scrambled off the airplane to catch our next flight to, finally, Rome. Luckily, our plane was a little late, so we thankfully did not miss our flight! At the end of our final plane trip (for the day), we found ourselves in the Fiumicino Airport on Wednesday evening, Italy time. Our family had been to the Philippines many times, but other then that we hadn't been to a foreign country in a while. It was much harder than I expected it to be! We faced a couple of challenges at the airport, like trying to find our baggage claim, trying to exchange our money, and trying to call the guy from the rental company who was to meet us at our apartment. When we completed those challenges, we went into a taxi, and drove around the ancient city of Rome. In the car, my mom read The Roman Coliseum, a mystery that takes place in Rome, to us in the cab. We also looked around at our surroundings, trying to figure things out on our own, since our taxi driver could not speak English. When we got to our street, we were surprised to find some odd differences on our street in Rome. We noticed that various restaurants placed small tables out in the street, so that the cars would have to squeeze through the tiny space in between the tables and the cars at the other side of the street. We also noticed that Europeans like small cars, like Smart Cars, because the streets are so crowded and there is almost no room to park. We found the rental guy waiting for us next to his scooter in front of our apartment. He opened the large, green door, decorated with two small lion heads, that lead to our apartment. We were disappointed to find that the stairs, floors, walls, and doors were all covered in dust, and nothing was very neat. But after we ventured a flight of stairs to the actual apartment, we were surprised to find a very nice, clean, and very modern apartment equipped with a living room with a small kitchen and table, and a nice bathroom and bedroom. After we settled into our new home, we finally ventured out into the streets of Rome. We did a little shopping at the local grocery store, and then fished around for an appetizing pizza restaurant. We then settled for "Il Chianti", a nice restaurant with an outdoor patio filled with tables, and many tables inside as well. We sat down to eat and checked out the menu. My brother and I ended up sharing a margherita pizza, my dad had a pizza with prosciutto (ham) and mushrooms, and my mom got a pumpkin ravioli.