Had to get up at 7:00 a.m. to shower and leave the hotel. Tried not to think that it was midnight Calgary time.

The noise from the hallway served better than an alarm clock. I had a fairly solid 6 1/2 hrs but there was no coffee in the room so we needed to drag our bags out of the hotel room and head for somewhere with coffee:

The hotel is at the north terminal but we were leaving from the south terminal. A shuttle bus runs every 5 minutes. Unfortunately, they won’t let you board with hot drinks so Scott and Sidney had to chuck their cups which were almost full. I could board with my oj.

We checked our bags which were all well under the 20 kg limit. Excellent! That means lots of capacity to bring stuff back on our return.

We finally got some breakfast at Cafe Rouge in the south terminal and had time for Scott to buy whisky while Robin and I got water and a supply of Kleenex packages. If the bathrooms are like our last visit to Italy, we’ll need the Kleenex for those place where toilet papers are noticably absent.

Our plane took off late because of 1/2 hour closure of the runway due to weather. It’s only a bit below zero and rainy as we waited to takeoff. Left at 11:35 instead of 10:50.

On board, we have no assigned seat so Sid and I are sitting together, Robin in the seat ahead and Scott behind. Nevertheless, the response to the flight seems to be similar:

We landed about 1/2 hr late. We had to leave via steps onto the Tarmac and then get on a bus for a two minute ride to the terminal.

The train station is right at the airport. Thinking I needed to buy tickets for everyone, I bought 5 tickets. Duh!

After a 5 minute train ride we arrived in Pisa Centrale where a number of trains were getting cancelled or delayed because of weather. This is a mystery to us. Although it’s overcast the temperature is mild enough Sidney isn’t wearing a jacket or hoodie.

We ended up catching a regionale train which stopped everywhere but we made it to Firenze by 5:30 p.m. only an hour later than planned.

— Post From Laurel’s iPhone