Long travel "day" which ran mostly on schedule with only a few slight delays. We started off as six from Tom & Barbara's house at 12:30, met Lisa and Connor at the airport and as eight flew directly from Atl to Rome. Landed and made our way, droopy eyed and slowly through customs with just a waive of the arm and a single question to Helen of her age - which she answered correctly! - Not even a stamp to our passports...... boooooohhh. A driver met us and shuttled our group by van, weaving aggressively through the multitude of small cars and motorcycles which filled the streets all the way to the train terminal. We passed a couple landmarks including the Colosseum which we will see closer up seven days later when we return to Rome. With some time to kill before our train we snacked on sandwiches and gelato - exhausted. It was approaching noon, Italy time and we had been traveling for 18 hours. We exchanged some dollars for euros and I grabbed a sandwich to go before boarding a high speed rail that took us through hills, tunnels and small towns to Firenze topping out at 140 mph.
We changed trains at the Florence open air terminal and Meghan commented on the number of folks smoking cigaretes - a noted difference from our travels in South America. Bathroom break in the crowded McDonalds and we were off again to Venice. Debby and Tom had to negotiate seats on a later train due to delays but all worked out and we exited the train right out onto the canals of Venice, an awesome sight. From wheels to wings to tracks we transfered to water taxi and had a great ride through the smaller canals, under low pedestrian bridges that you could slap with a hand and out into the Canal Grande, past Piazza San Marco, to our hotel - tucked away in a small alley. I will have to look at a map tomorrow, right now it is 6pm and we have been in motion for 24 hours.
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