here we go again, off down the road again . . .

with packed bags, we headed to Orlando to catch a flight to Dulles, and a red eye to Rome. We won't mention my disdain of United Airlines and its sardine mentality, or its lack of working reading lights or its I've seen cleaner bathrooms at truck stops . . . gee, I guess I just did. Oops!

One of the things I kvetched about, was being in Rome a second time and still not having had a chance to actually see the city. But extra days just weren't in the budget. Last year we were so late getting in, we almost missed the boat, this time we, and some 100+ other would be sailors were way to early . . . 8:00 a.m. . . . for the staterooms on the boat to be ready. They were in fact, just recently vacated by the last cruisers and to stall for time, the cruise lines put us on three motor coaches for a freebie tour of Rome. Color me insanely happy!!! Of course having been up for some 20 odd hours, some of our fellow travelers were not so pleased at this opportunity, especially Raymond, a dead ringer for Jeffrey Jones, who we had met in the D.C. airport, with his charming if not brow beaten wife, Wilma. Raymond was ballistic. Killing the messenger would be an overstatement. Red faced with steam escaping through unseen cracks in his skull, Raymond was hitting high C and about to have apoplexy. We skulked out to make sure we were on a different bus.



We stopped at a cathedral to walk around a bit and then headed to ancient Rome and passed the Coliseum!!!



Oh just let me faint now and get it over with. Katie was glued to one window while I was at another, snapping away faster than the cast of Grease doing Hand Jive. All we needed were white socks, white belts and polyester dresses and we would be the typical touristas. Did we care? Not one iota.

Meanwhile, another advocate of the 'get me to the boat quick team', kept scuttling up the aisle to demand we head for port "forthwith"!!!! Which we did after passing a few more amazing antiquities. Let me just faint once again.

Finally, we arrived in Civitavecchia. The rooms still were not ready which caused more belly aching but the dining room was open for lunch and who can resist meandering through a buffet of goodies causing much drool and wide eyes? At 3:00 p.m. we were all ensconced in our rooms snoozing away, except maybe Raymond, who I am certain had exploded somewhere into tiny bits of green foam.

Back on deck, we watched as the ship pulled out of port. Game on!!!