The trip to Perugia

The trip to Perugia was loooooooooong.  Really, really, really long.  Extremely long.  (Did you get that?  It was long.)  First, an hour and a half in the car from Epsom to Boston.  That was spiced up a bit by a HUGE rainstorm on the way there; the highway was more like a river.  Fortunately, by the time we got to the tunnel all the water had drained out, so it didn't matter that we forgot the submarine.  Some may think that a rainstorm was an ominous start to the trip, but I prefer to look on the bright side: there was a rainbow!  It was even a triple rainbow.  One doubly thick rainbow, and a faint extra one above.  (It is there, I swear it is.  Extra points if you can spot it.)

At the airport, there was a bit of a hassle with my luggage.  I had over-packed, no big surprise for anybody who knows me.  Goodbye laptop... see you in a few weeks...  Once luggage was sorted out, security came up way too quickly.  I didn't even get to say goodbye to Alice, who drove me, Dad, and my new friend and traveling companion, E., to the airport.   But she called after I got through security so that was okay.  

The flight itself was approximately 8-hour overnight flight to Munich.  For some people, this would be the perfect thing; get some sleep and the flight's shorter and you're nice and rested.  For me, it was rather dreadful, because I just can't sleep on planes or cars.  However, on the bright side, E. and I got the whole back row to ourselves!

From Munich, we had a connecting flight to Rome, which was about 2 hours long...  At that point I was exhausted, but I still thought it was an awesome flight.  It was a tiny plane, which was really cool, and it was almost empty.  And we got yummy rosemary-bread-soft-cheese-prosciutto sandwiches!  Best of all, there were no TV screens, so the flight attendant had to act out the safety lecture.  She had to do it three times, because it was in Italian, German, and English.  It was probably the first time that I actually enjoyed the safety lecture; it made the flight for me.

After those plane rides, some people (they were actually awake) from MusicFest met us at the airport.  How nice to see people who spoke English and knew who we were and where we were going and how to get there!  The bad news: there was a three-and-a-half-hour bus ride to Perugia.  That was the worst leg of the trip.  I'd been awake and nervous for about 24 hours, and to make matter worse, the bus was hot.  Air-conditioned, yes, but not enough.  I closed my eyes and maybe I napped for a few minutes, which was a small miracle and kept me on my feet for the rest of the day.  To keep myself sane, I took lots of pictures.

Finally, the bus ride was over.  We got off the bus, dragged our luggage up a bunch of escalators and some ancient ruins (about which more later), and arrived at the hotel.  I don't remember that evening very clearly, I was so tired...  I remember being confused about a hotel deposit, and not knowing who my roommate was going to be... I remember meeting some people at Baldo's, the restaurant where we got dinner...  and I know that I went to bed as soon as I could.  Traveling for about fifteen hours is a grueling ordeal.  I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

To be continued...