Flying to Rome – Lucky we Arrived

 

We are now on Air Alitalia heading for Rome. I say that with a sigh of relief, it was a rough road to board our flight.

Early in the game, for some reason things started to go wrong. I found it strange that I couldn’t check in for our connection in Halifax from Toronto to Rome. I thought last night, West Jet would take care of this when we get to the airport. Not so! The agent said it would be easy though for us to pick up our  boarding pass when we arrive in Toronto and reassured us we were checked through and wouldn’t have to go through security again.

This was not the case ..our flight was 30 minutes late so we rushed down to our gate when we landed with our luggage in hand …so much better to  travel light. Ahh but there was a checkpoint before the gate and we were told we had to exit and go to departures. We returned to the Westjet counter and the agent told us to go back and just show our itinerary. We returned with the WestJet Agent…another refusal of entry. Now it’s getting late, only a half hour before boarding. I am so stressed and convinced we will not make it but we give it our best . We go through the exit  and find the Alitalia  desk  ..they have given away our seats away. We were able to get seats at the back of the plane. We go through security and  just make within minutes of boarding.

We are really crammed on this Alitalia flight.  The plane is pretty beat up …no movie screen and worn out seats.  My tray was cracked in the middle, had to hold my meal on my lap…wondered what else was cracked. The man next me had a seat that was in recline only…upright not possible. It will be a long night I am sure.

Bottom line I am not happy at all with Westjet and their Codeshare arrangements. We will always make sure to take a direct flight to Europe.

Well our flight arrived early and we both managed to get a couple of hours sleep. Here we are in Rome! Yah!! Huge lineup to get through security and it took an hour. We took the Leonardo express …it was easy to find ..just downstairs . Only 14 euro each and arrived into the city within 30 minutes. Once off the train we got directions and walked to our hotel.

Hotel Dorica is better than expected, nice clean room with a view of the plaza. Lots of little restaurants everywhere and only 10 minutes from the Terminal Station. The receptionist was very helpful. After a short nap and a shower we walked to the restaurant Napoli. It’s a simple pizza place but we had great pastas salad and bruschetta . Their red house wine was light and delicious.