Up early for our flight to Sofia, Bulgaria. We had planned to spend the night in a mountain hut high in the Rila Mountains of Bulgaria, summit Mt. Musala tomorrow, then go to a music festival in Central Bulgaria on Saturday.
We had arranged with the hotel front desk for a taxi at 4:00 a.m. for our 6:20 flight. Down to the front desk at 3:50; the clerk calls for a taxi (which he was supposed to do last night), "no taxis, on strike today." The strike was announced in advance and started yesterday, but the clerk did not bother to tell us last night. No Uber or other ride apps in Napoli (the strike was to protest a bill that would allow such apps). The first bus to the airport leaves at 5:40 (1). No other flight options to Sofia today (2).
So, with a few choice words, we went back to bed, and caught the local train to Rome later in the morning (3). While we love Rome, the city is much less fun when you had planned to be someplace else. The scooters running red lights and going full tilt down pedestrian-only roads seem less charming and just rude as you jump out of the way.
We had enjoyed our visit earlier this week to Cinque Terre. Being the height of the travel season, rooms were hard to find, but one room was available in Riomaggiore, the southernmost of the 5 towns, which I quickly booked. We took the local trains north, with a stop in Pisa long enough to see the tower.
We walked up to the hotel: "Sorry, there was a mistake in the booking system, we do not have a room." Uh oh. "But, to honor your reservation, we found a three bedroom apartment in town which we can give you at the room price." "Grazie mille, signorina" I replied. She eyed me skeptically, and replied in perfect English: "It's been a long time since I've been a 'signorina.'"
We wandered down to the seaside rocks where people were sunbathing and jumping into the sea. We joined them; I only scraped two places on my legs on the barnacle encrusted rocks (4).
(1) Apparently the Neopolitan authorities cannot read a flight schedule, as the first bus arrives too late to catch any of the first 19 flights of the day.
(2) We had planned to fly back to Italy on Sunday. As it turned out, we would have been stranded in Bulgaria due to an Italian air traffic control strike that day anyway (a). An accurate tourism slogan for Italy would be: "Welcome to Italy, we don't give a damn about you."
(a) At least we missed the northern Italy rail strike by one day.
(3) Without advance planning, local train are often the only option in Italy. The various strikes we encountered inhibited any advance planning.
(4) When our kids were young and they would go to the pediatrician with scrapes, bumps, and bruises, he would say something like: "Good, you're getting outdoors and having fun."
At Pisa
Colorful tree in Riomaggiore
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