The New York summer hear hit us harder than the Italian heat. It's definitely the humidity factor. I wasn't prepared for what felt like a wall of heat that I encountered a. walking out of the airport and b. waking into my apartment. It was so hot even my floors were uncomfortable to walk on. Thankfully, the air conditioner helped in minutes and it was bearable.
Lets recap the flights back.
We left Florence and took our first flight that led us to Dusseldorf, Germany at 12:45. Well, we were supposed to leave at that time but we were actually shuttled to the plane at that time. We finally left around ... 1:20ish. It was okay, though. We had a layover of about 2 hours, so the layover wasn't as long. The flight had more turbulence than we were ready for, but thank God we arrived safely.
Once we arrived at the Dusseldorf airport we went to customs so we could get to our gate. There we encountered a slight problem. I don't know how this happened but when we crossed into the Italian borders, the men looked at or passports and just basically just acknowledged us. I didn't think to ask for the stamps. From now on you can bet I will be expecting a stamp from that country's border patrol. After proving to them, via photo of our itinerary, when we arrived in Italy they allowed us to cross through customs. For those moments where were were unsure of what would come next, we were definitely scared. What if they had not let us through? Quite the momentarily terrifying thought. I thanked God as soon as they let us through.
Here we are at the beginning of the flight to JFK.
Our 8 hour flight was not terrible. Not to me, at least. I mean, the time did seem to pass slowly, but we made good use of it ... I read a bit, slept, watched some shows and played solitaire. Nat did the same, but in a different order. She was over the long flight after a while.
Soon enough, well 8 hours later, we landed at home -- JFK. I think we landed around 7 p.m. Here are the smiles of two happy & semi sleepy gals.
We were welcomed by all & my dad was kind enough to meet / surprise us at the airport. Thankfully, a kind soul met us with my car and we were on our way back home.
After traveling all day and then some, I didn't get to bed until ... Maybe 12:30 a.m. our time & was up by 5:50 in the morning. It's been a struggle to get back to our time zone, as Italy is 6 hours ahead. I've been exhausted by 8 & up before 6 a.m. these past few days. Hopefully just a few more days of that because I just want to be able to sleep till at least 7.
Nat has been with Marisel & crew in South Carolina since we've returned. They visited with our cousins as Lindsay's family for her father's wedding.
Although we returned early, and every day was not as smooth as I had envisioned it to be, I do hope Nat had a good, if not great, trip. Hopefully she saw most of what she had hoped to, learned some valuable lessons and will continue visiting other countries when the opportunity presents itself to her. Nat is a precious individual. I look forward learning of her future endeavors and possibly being a part of them ... Provided they aren't away for longer than 7 days. ;)
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