Ok, this is a real thing. I will admit both Mike and I had a severe case of “Travitude” the past 48 hours. Yup, not ashamed, nor proud of it. It’s just one of those things. Perhaps, it is being intensified by the current state of our world. I think we all are craving to go back to our lives. It’s been too much, too long. I know we are. Enough of that, back to my travitude.
Let’s go back a bit. We are in Italy, remember living our BEST lives! Stuffing our faces with authentic & delicious Italian foods, our stomachs are full of incredible gelato, we are quenching our thirst with the finest wine around……remember those days? Nope, neither do I. None of that happened.
It actually took us 3 weeks to go sit for a minute and get ourselves a $1.30 cup of cappuccino. We never ate out, not even once. But, we did enjoy a $4.00 bottle of wine from our local Conad grocery store almost nightly:) haha! My point is, you don’t need the finest things in Italy to enjoy being in Italy. You also don’t need everything to go right, all the time. We of course were there with the intent to do renovations and get our newly purchased home in order. We had no idea what we were about to experience.
We went through the gamut of emotions while there. I know I had a complete meltdown. It’s hard being away. It’s even harder being away when one of your babies is in major vascular surgery. A brutal surgery that you yourself have endured. So, that didn’t help my emotions ☹️. We had things go wrong …..daily. We had complications with all of our “systems”, electric, plumbing and oh ya that cantina thing lol. However, all that being said here we are missing our “home away from home”. Missing Italy.
There were 2 reasons we ended up cutting our trip in Italy short. Yes, I was homesick. I’ve said before, aren’t we all wishing to be somewhere else? And then this thing called flippin covid. We heard the threat of yet another lock down coming. As of Monday, March 15th, 2021 we were going back to RED in our region. What did that even flippin mean? We didn’t want to find out LOL. Not truly knowing what that would mean, we decided it would be best to head home a week early. No regrets, it just meant we had some unfinished work to do that would require another trip! Plus, we hadn’t yet just relaxed…..
La Dolce Vita.
”You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart will always be elsewhere. That’s the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place.”
Well, if you are looking yourself, buckle up! OMG have prices gone up. Talk about supply and demand….or maybe gas prices have been dramatically increased. Whatever it may be, or a combination of everything, it is really insane. We had luckily received a travel credit back from Chase via Delta when our trip details changed. That credit was good for a year and must be redeemed on the same airline. I had no issues with Delta and thought they were a great carrier to Italy. We did fly both Delta and Alitalia (via Delta). Delta tends to be pricer than say Aerlingus. Delta also has “covid free flights” which don’t require quarantine!
The only issue we have had was reaching the Chase travel agents. Our credit was given via Chase and unfortunately we couldn’t redeem the credit on the app ourselves. We had to call. “Due to high call demand you will have a wait time of 30+ minutes”. Our 30+ minutes went on for 1:58 minutes last night….and then …we were disconnected! What the……bleep!
A late night until 1:30 am frustrated had us calling again this am. Let’s say that after our 2nd call and on hold for another 1:38 minutes….our travitude was in high gear. I just have to set the scene though. Me across from Mike at the table, my phone going on speaker….2 cups of coffee on refills….trying to coordinate dates, times, airports……and Mike’s readers fell off his face and broke 👓…..he picks them up in a swoop…back on his face ….crooked lol. I literally can’t. Sorry Smartie! Your travitude is pretty strong there mister haha!!! (Insert photo lmao).
We successfully booked ourselves a return trip to Italy! Now trying to rent a car posed yet another problem. Apparently everyone and their nonna are headed to Italy this summer! When we were just there for the month from February to March, we paid 435.00 euros total for our car rental. Prices now for under a month are in the $600-800-4000.00 price range! Are you kidding me?
We used both “Italian car rental” which was in the terminal at Fiumicino Airport and we also used “Ace Car Rental”, which we took a quick shuttle to an off property. Both companies were very easy to work with. This trip we successfully, were able to book with “Centauro” which has a shuttle as well from the airport. The price was definitely not what the other agencies were quoting upwards of thousands, but a more manageable $509.00. Not so bad for the 3 weeks. Thank God we now own our home.
If you are planning a trip to Europe, (or anywhere for that matter) I certainly suggest you start looking now. Start checking out prices and do your due diligence of comparison shopping. There are better rates out there! You may just need to get a full blown case of travitude like we did, to get your blood pressure going and your migraine raging! However, brighter days are ahead. I imagine us under the “Tuscan sun”….. stuffing my face as much as I can with gelato this trip!! All while enjoying the simpler things in life. Like slowing down. Like stopping to smell the flowers. Like playing rummy every night while laughing at the days events and the shenanigans we got ourselves into. I look forward to all of it, me and my Smartie pants.
“I’m not fluent in Italian yet, but I’m fluent in gelato and that’s pretty much the same thing”.
Yes, I got the travel bug! I miss my charming village and familiar faces. I miss our sweet neighbors cat, Camilla. I hope she remembers us and if she only knew how much we have been missing her sweetness. Our other neighbor Giovani sent me an updated photo of her, telling me she is doing ok! 🙂 How incredibly sweet was that!
All my “Italian peeps”, I hope your home search is going well. I hope you are staying focused despite the craziness around us! The world will heal and open up soon! Stay positive and keep dreaming those dreams. You will not regret them. You will soon have a bad case of travitude and the only cure I hear is a return flight back to Italy!!
Smartie and I (and hopefully our oldest daughter Kailee) will be back in our home in Poggio Nativo from Monday June 21st – Wednesday July 14th. If you are over there and in our area, please send me a message! We pray we get wifi figured out this trip!! Well, before we arrive. I still have to reach out to Vodafone and see if my twin, the other Kerri Lee Dunn Smart paid her outstanding invoice lol. So hopefully I can reply this trip. I am on whatsapp too! Reach out and say hello!
“Traveling is like flirting with life. It’s like saying ~ I would stay and love you, but I have to go…this is my station”.
Ciao for now friends!! Keep dreaming! Stay positive and stay happy! Remember, this too shall pass.
