Planes, Trains and Pizza Fables

Waiting for McDonald's to open at 4:30 AM in DFW

Well, after a grand total of 3 hours and 38 minutes of sleep, Blake and I blearily packed up my car (with the assistance of my parents) and headed to the airport.  We arrived before even McDonald’s opened up….that’s insanity!  We stalked McDonald’s for a while until they finally lifted their cage screen, and Blake and I purchased the two most delicious egg mcmuffins ever created (one sans cheese, gross).  Who knows when we are going to have another egg for breakfast?!  It might be an ENTIRE month from now!

Well folks, we are off to Europe.  In theory of course.  At the moment we are on a grand tour of middle sized airports throughout the US (I guess that’s what happens when you use your mileage points for a “free” ticket).  Note to everyone – the Raleigh, NC airport is superb.

Just to let everyone know, we will officially be posting to my site (Sugar and Caffeine) and linking from Blake’s site.  We even brought my mom’s little flip camera, so I am sure there will be some riveting videos for you to enjoy as well.

Wish us luck – we will soon (relative term) be in Zurich, hoping to find a train that will whisk us off to Italy, land of the horse races.  Talk to you then….

Kristi

UPDATE: Ok, so this is Blake. And we are in Florence!

Train to Milan

It took us a grand total of 30 hours to get here, but we made it. The transportation list: 3 planes, 3 trains, multiple escalators (both vertical and horizontal) and our feet. I love the fact that we used miles to get here and back, and definitely think it was worth it, but good lord, that was a long trek.

(It also helped that AA was showing The Tooth Fairy and Bride Wars on the way over. Let me tell you, both are Oscar worthy.)

Loggia Fiorentina

We timed our sleeping just about right and were actually able to get in a semi-useful day here. Disclaimer: It is 9:15 pm and Kristi is asleep next to me, so not a crazy day, but much more than I thought we would after all that travel.

Our place is a GREAT little hotel. It was a) cheaper than a hostel, 2) exceptionally clean, IV) private room, b) great location, and 5) cool staff. (The guy at the desk was about our age and said the phrase “You can not tell me a fable about pizza” to tell us how good a pizza joint down the street is.)

We basically just walked around, got the lay of the land, purchased our train tickets to Siena for Palio tomorrow, and, of course, ate gelato.

I have a feeling there will be many, many more pics like this

Tomorrow promises to be packed full of action at the Palio horse races. The race dates back to the year 1260 and apparently not much has changed. I will leave the details for the next blog post, but to get an idea of what it is, check out the action from last year… awesome.

And, yes, two of the jockeys fell off but according to tradition, their horses can still win the race for them. That one turn is nuts!

Ciao,

Blake