We met downstairs in the hotel  at 8AM , grabbed breakfast and walked outside to meet *LUIGI* !. Luigi is the driver we hired to help us find our way through rural Italy . We thought pretty hard about how to get around … we looked into planes, trains, buses… then  we decided to rent a car.. but after thinking about it more we decided to hire a driver… and it is looking like that was the best decision  we could have made !

Luigi has been driving folks for 25 years.. (including folks like tom hanks)  he speaks perfect english and is super fun to be with.  We jumped in the van and were soon on our way to Abruzzo … the ancestral homeland of Diane’s dads family.  I cant tell you too much about the drive because like anytime I  get in a car, I fall instantly asleep  🙂

 

 

We stopped for a snack and realized we werent in kansas anymore 

 

about 3 hours later we got to Casacanditella  in Abruzzo.. It’s very near Fara Fallorum Petri where Diane’s grandmother was from.   We’re rented an AirBnb from Valerio and his wife. THe place is called Villa Panarama and it is sooooo beautiful !

The house is a ways down a dirt road/path that is too gnarly for Luigis nice van.. ao we walk there and back when we want to meet him. It’s kinda nice.. no neighbors .. just olives, grapes, figs and us !

Our first stop was the nearest city Guardiagrele . The city was a nice surprise. It’s old city center was atop a hill (like many of the cities we will visit)   .. (I dont think i’ve ever used the word “atop”) 

 

We were wandering around the town when we accidentally ran into our airbnb landlord. He lives down one of the tiny streets in a building tha used to be his grandfathers private hospital. His kitchen is the old operating theater.   His family crest was on this cool old wall on the cathedral.

 

Next stop was Fara Fallorum Petri. The town where both of Diane’s father’s parents were born.   Diane’s grandfather died in the early 1960s.. Her grandmother was a wonderful presense in our lives until 1995.  

It was so cool walkign the same streets they did. .

We were about to leave when we saw luigi walking up the street  with  this guy. Turns out the guy whose name was Franco was from  the regions record office. They hasd started talkign because franco was wearign a Roma Soccor shirt.. Luigis favorite team..    We talked to Franko for a while and he told us (via Luigi’s translation) that there were many folks who had moved back from the US to Fara. He told us there was even a woman from Binghampxon on the street. 

 

 

We had read about the Farchie   an annual festival in January that commemorates a ‘miricale’ when the residents of Fara were able to turn away some attacking French soldiers by lighting trees on fire. Durign the Farchi the residents make bundles of reeds 20 feet tall and packed with fireworks and light them up in the town square ! (Kinda like their own burning man !)   

There were signs of the Farchie spread around town. 

 

We were about to leave town when Franco found us again and tld us to come with him. He introduced us to Maria.. the woman on his street who was born in Bighampton,. raised in Rochester then moved back to Fara. It was so fun talkig to her. She spoke enlgish (of course) with a Western NY accent.. and perfect Fara Italian.   Her last name is Deritis… and  her family was in one of the wonderful genealogy  books we’re carrying  that were written  by DIanes brother Steve !  She’s a very distant relative by marriage to diane. 

 

aria and her kids all live in a huge house.. She just welcoemd a new granddaughter.. !

 

Maria and her family run a small bar around the corner. She invited us in for a drink and snacks and we talked more family !

 

Maria told us about the ancient tunnels found under the town that we’re used as escape routes

we stopped at a small store on the way home to stock up. Always fun to see another country’s stores. Soooo many types of pasta !

 

THen home to Villa panarama for dinenr and our first night in Abruzzo

 

So far so fun !

nite all, nite sam

-me

THe flight over was cramped and I had unpleasant seat mates.. but I quickly fell asleep. We got to IST around 3. We were booked on al ter flight to rome.. but There was a 5PM flight from IST to Rome. We witied in one line to see if we could go standbu on the eralier flight..w e got shittled from oen lien to another.. and they told us to run to the gate. The folks at the gate were super unhelpful and would not event talk to us about standby, even though seats were available.. ugh

THat left us with a 10 PM flight.. getting in at 11:20 to rome. too late for us to meet our driver and get to our airbnb in Abriuzzo.. (double ugh !)…

Istanbul is one of my favorite cites.. but it was too far to go into the city so we made the  best of it by wandering aroudn the vey nice istanbull ariport for what ended up being about 6 hours.  Again we camped in the very. very nice turkish air launge and ate some of the best travel food I’d ever eaten !!!!   then visited stores, galleries and even the very cool archeological musem in the instanbull airport.  

 

It was a small museum/. but it did a great job of using interactives.. like this statue with moving eyes

 

To make matters even worse.. our flight was delayed an extra one and a half hours for maintainance reasons. We finally boarted about 11pm

 

We got to Rome just after 1AM.. and walked to teh hotel that our agency had booked for us. Our dirver knew to pick us up there early the next morning. We’d already lost a day of vacation.. but we were in itlay !

We slept a couple of hours.. and woke up  ON VACATION !

Nite all, nite sam

-me

Our italy trip starts today,.. (or it was supposed to !).. Jen picked up linda, david, diane and me around noon and took us the the airport for our flight to Italy . Our plan was to fly form Burlington to Dulles, then an hour and a half later catch a flight to Rome. 

 

That was the plan at last .. *sigh*.. 

We boarded the plane on time.. then just before taxing we got the news that there was a ground hold on all inbound flights to IAD.. no reason was given.. but the weather there was fine.. so it must have been staffing (grrrrrr) .. `15 min passed, then a half hour, then and hour.. and then we knew we wouldnt make our 5PMish rome connection. As soon as things started slippig I started workign on an alternative connection with united.. but no luck.. with the groudn hold .. so may folks flights were disrupted that all the outbound conenctiosn got messed up too. ALl the flights to rome or anywhere close were already full. United automatically rebooked us on a flight the next day or the day after (!).. no way we were doing that. I managed to grab the last 4 seats on a Turkish air flight to room with a stop over in Istanbul  paying full cost.. that left at 10:45 pm…Eventually I got United to pay for those flights and refunded…  so we hunkered down in the very delicious Turkish air lounge and waited for that much later flight .. 

So.. we got aboard that flight.. none of us sitting together.. none of us with the better seats I’d used points to procure.. but at least we were on our way..

 

 

 

That was the plan at last .. *sigh*.. 

We boarded the plane on time.. then just before taxing we got the news that there was a ground hold on all inbound flights to IAD.. no reason was given.. but the weather there was fine.. so it must have been staffing (grrrrrr) .. `15 min passed, then a half hour, then and hour.. and then we knew we wouldnt make our 5PMish rome connection. As soon as things started slippig I started workign on an alternative connection with united.. but no luck.. with the groudn hold .. so may folks flights were disrupted that all the outbound conenctiosn got messed up too. ALl the flights to rome or anywhere close were already full. United automatically rebooked us on a flight the next day or the day after (!).. no way we were doing that. I managed to grab the last 4 seats on a Turkish air flight to room with a stop over in Istanbul  paying full cost.. that left at 10:45 pm…Eventually I got United to pay for those flights and refunded…  so we hunkered down in the very delicious Turkish air lounge and waited for that much later flight .. 

So.. we got aboard that flight.. none of us sitting together.. none of us with the better seats I’d used points to procure.. but at least we were on our way..

 

That was the plan at last .. *sigh*.. 

We boarded the plane on time.. then just before taxing we got the news that there was a ground hold on all inbound flights to IAD.. no reason was given.. but the weather there was fine.. so it must have been staffing (grrrrrr) .. `15 min passed, then a half hour, then and hour.. and then we knew we wouldnt make our 5PMish rome connection. As soon as things started slippig I started workign on an alternative connection with united.. but no luck.. with the groudn hold .. so may folks flights were disrupted that all the outbound conenctiosn got messed up too. ALl the flights to rome or anywhere close were already full. United automatically rebooked us on a flight the next day or the day after (!).. no way we were doing that. I managed to grab the last 4 seats on a Turkish air flight to room with a stop over in Istanbul  paying full cost.. that left at 10:45 pm…Eventually I got United to pay for those flights and refunded…  so we hunkered down in the very delicious Turkish air lounge and waited for that much later flight .. 

So.. we got aboard that flight.. none of us sitting together.. none of us with the better seats I’d used points to procure.. but at least we were on our way..

Nite all, nite sam

-me

We leave tomorrow for italy.l. spent the day cleaning up from all the prep we’ve been doing on the house. MId morning my cousin’s Mark and Kathy came by the house.  They were in town for a freinds daugheters wedding. 41 years ago Mark showed up at our house and introduced himself as my cousin.. His grandmother Keenie was my great great aunt (she’s top left in this picture alonmg with my two other great aunts gussie and freydie.. amd my grandmother in the bottom left.. not sure wh that is in the upper right).  

  She’s second from  left in  bottom row here.. my sister and grandmotehr in teh upper left. 

We had a good time marveling at how liong we’ve known each other.. we went to their wedding.

 

They came to ours (editors mnopte.. I was just trying to find a picture of them at our wedding and ended up spending a half hour looking at our wedding pictures.. got so wrappewd up in them I forgot what I was doing.. so great looking at those pics with all that family.. I realllllly love diane 🙂 

 

Anyway.. very glad to see  mark and kathy  

Great catching up !

 

Later on in the day.. Linda and david showed up. THey drove up to vermont so that we could start the Italy trip together . We’re leaving tomorrow and are so excited !

nite all, nite sam 

0me