On April 28th, Saturday, it's time to get to Hotel Noto to meet up with the group. Brian came over to get me and helped me drag my luggage. We stopped at a cafe in a very nice area near my hotel and the Vatican to have some snacks and Caffe Americano on our way to the subway. I had a really yummy square of pizza with some delicious salami on it. Brian got our coffees and talked into getting a slice of tirimisu that tasted like Heaven.
We made it to Termini Station after about 40 minutes. The subway was surprisingly nice and easy to maneauver through. Although i kept seeing a sign that read "uscita" an kept asking Brian what stop that was and was that just the name of the green line or something. It was a green sign at every stop the train opened its doors at. Brian got a really good kick out if that because Uscita means "EXIT" in Italian. Now, no matter where we are, if there is a green uscita sign, Brian says "look Aven, the green line drops off right here too!"
We walked over to the hotel and got checked in. Sarah was already in our room, napping because she had flown in from Barcelona early that morning. She spent a week in Spain prior to the tour.
We had our intro meeting at 4:00pm and then headed out for our welcome dinner. There are 51 people in the tour and a great mixture. I already know Brian and Sarah and had exchanged a couple emails with another guy named Jacob. Im not the oldest either....Im the 3rd oldest. None of these youngins believe I'm 30. It's flattering. Dinner was a pizza making demonstration but was a lot of fun and very cool to see. We had two giant pizzas for every four people and two bottles of wine. There was a little entertainment. It was an older Italian singer who was hilarious. He kept walking around the tables singing to different girls. He had missing teeth and was quite creepy but we couldn't help but just laugh at the man.
After dinner we did a lengthy walking tour of Rome. Yannick, our tour guide, walked us around the city to the Spanish Steps, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, and many piazza's. It was neat to see everything...even at night.
Once the walking tour was over he took whoever wanted to go to a bar where we paid one price and had open bar for a few hours. It was the first night so it was really fun watching everyone let lose a little and begin to get to know one another.
I ended up meeting a group of 4 Argentinians. They spoke pretty good english but not great so I got to dance the night away with them and speak Spanish to them. We had a blast and they kept saying they wanted "besos". I only kissed them on the cheek of course. ;-) They were such babies though. I felt like I could be their gramma when I found out they were only 20 yrs old. Oh well....."When in Rome", right?!?!?
We stayed pretty late and I was among the last 5 who stayed there with Yannick. He got all of us back to the hotel via Taxi. Yannick is really funny and pretty good looking too, did I mention that yet? He is 29 and Italian but does Contiki tours all over Europe. He will only get 12 hours off before going to a Greece tour after ours ends.
Once I got back to the hotel I found it difficult to sleep. I keep doing this every night. I go to bed and have trouble falling asleep because in my head I keep thinking "it's only 7:00pm at home". I guess that's what jet lag is....hmmmmmm.
The first day was very successful and an excellent start to the tour. I knew right then that I made the best decision coming here and picking Contiki as my tour.
I'll upload pics and videos tonight. You all with love them!
Ciao!!!!!!!
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