Patty Flew the Coop: The Beginning of My Journey.....

Let me just start with the fact that the beginning of my trip did not start out at all like I had planned.

Kyle and I started out on my little venture a little after seven the morning that my flight left (Wednesday, Jan. 4). Everything started out fine, and it wasn't until we stopped to get gas and got back on the road when the problems started to occur...

We started back on the road and a little while after we noticed that Kyle's car started to hesitate but we didn't really think much of it. By the time we got to Dunkerton, it had died without any clue as to why. Luckily we were able to get it started back up and ran all the way home to switch cars.

Now, almost 8:30 we hit the road again and when we made it through Dunkerton without any problems we thought we were doing pretty good. We even made it to the O'Hare airport without any further problems and Kyle had none on his journey back home. My problems, however, had only just begun to start happening.

The flight to Madrid was wonderful. I flew through Iberia which is a Spanish airline so let me just point out that the food through European airlines are much better than those from American... I was served chicken with yellow rice, steamed spinach and carrots, a crab salad accompanied by a leaf of lettuce, tomato and black olive, along with a dinner roll with a wedge brie, and finally tiramisu for dessert. I must say it was probably some of the best airplane food I have ever had. And, on top of it all, we had an atypical breakfast of a croissant filled with ham and cheese, a fruit cup of the best honey due ever, a mini muffin, and a KitKat-what could have been better?

Madrid-Barajas Airport

Upon arriving in Madrid, Sarah and I were amazed at the interior of the airport. The ceiling was constructed of these curved wooden panels that were repeated throughout. It quickly became one of our favorite airports. After the initial awe, we noticed two ladies from the airport standing at the end of the hallway directing people to their connecting flights. There were no gate postings anywhere that we could see and so we tried to follow their directions but we soon found out that their airport is almost impossible to navigate. After running up and down three floors, we finally found an Italian couple on the same flight as ours to attempt to follow through the airport. We managed to catch our connecting flight even though everyone else was already boarded. Then the flight attendant decided that my carry-on was too big and checked it beneath the plane. This was no longer our favorite airport...

When we finally arrived in Rome, I waited by the door for my carry-on bag just to find out that I needed to go to luggage retrieval to get it. Sarah and I arrived and the luggage carousel and there was hardly any luggage there. A few minutes later another group of bags arrived, none of which of course were ours. After a few more times, my carry-on finally showed up along with the rest of Sarah's bags, but unfortunately, my checked bags were not among them. We waited for ten more minutes before making our way to lost luggage. Luckily, the man at the desk spoke English and I was able to fill out all of the necessary paperwork and give an address for the delivery.

Keys to My Apartment!!

Finally, we were able to leave the airport and take a taxi into the center of Rome. After we drove through the Aurelian walls it finally hit us-we were in Roma!! We checked in with the housing office, got a taxi to our apartment and everything seemed to be getting better. That is, until we got to our door....

I'm on the second floor of our building which technically means that it's the third and you have to go up half a flight of stairs before you even reach the ground floor. So let's just say that dragging my luggage up the stairs did not seem like the best idea so instead I took the elevator which was barely big enough for myself and my carry-on bag. Then we get to the door.

The entrance to our apartment is an older style, wooden, double door with a very complex locking system. One key (the huge long one) unlocks a five bolt system in our door while one of the others does a dead bolt above that. Unfortunately, we didn't know the little tricks to unlocking the door and probably spent about fifteen minutes trying to get in before we finally gave up and knocked on our neighbors door since we heard a kid inside and knew someone would be home. She thankfully showed us the tricks to the locks and we were able to get inside where we found a note from our other roommates who said it best-"We're in Italy!"