Steve's most Heinous Adventure, THE CONCLUSION!, FINAL UPDATE and longest. Options

[stephenaki]

So, everyone got an initial taste of my grand adventure trying to pick up my car in Italy. Well, here is ‘the rest of the story’ and let me be up front, this is long and only the beginning. I will submit another entry a little later but here is the beginning of the tale.

OK, so lets begin first with a short geography lesson to get everyone acquainted with where I am going from and too. Now, if you look at a map of Italy you see the boot and next to the toe, a small island that I refer to as the football or, if you want to get technical, Sicilia. It is on this island that I have to pick up the car. On the south east portion of the island is Catania which, is where I flew into. Continuing south is Augusta bay where my Navy hosts took me to pick up the car.

From Augusta, one has to drive to Messina, which is on the north east part of the island and closest to the toe of the boot. From Messina, you take a vehicle ferry to Villa San Giovanni and then follow the Autostrada up to Napoli. Rome is the halfway point of Italy and Napoli about an hour or so south on the west coast of Italy. All in all, from Augusta to Napoli it is approximaly 400 Miles. Why is Napoli important when I am trying to go all the way to Germany? Because, it was my interim stop for a couple of weeks before I pressed on north to Germany.

So, lets start with the first phase of the operation, the flight from Napoli to Catania. First off, know this, German law requires that I have the following three things in my car, Triangle warning kit, govt approved first aid kit (think of what might be in there) and a reflective orange vest. I have all these things to include a set of license plates in my backpack as I head to the airport.

The fun begins on the way there as I have to return a rental car before I fly but need to find a gas station open at 0530 in the morning. As luck would have it, I found a station not far from Capodechino airport; problem begins with trying to find my way back. My GPS is trying to take me through some back roads that are now one way roads due to all the garbage the Italians have piled up on the roads. I was only 5 minutes from the airport but it took me 30 minutes to get back. So now, I’m running a bit late as my flight leaves at 0700 and I finally get to the airport at 0615.

Still got time, no problem! Or at least that is what I thought until I saw the security gate line! Well, first things first, find Air one and check in. Oh look there they are and no one in line for them; since I am not checking any bags, this should be easy and it is. I do however ask the check in clerk if there will be any issues with what is in my back pack. He assures me that what I have is not a problem…he would be mistaken.

I get into the security line at 0620, did I mention my flight leaves at 0700? As I wait patiently, several people push past me and start cutting in front of the 30 other people waiting to go through the security point. First off, Italians don’t understand the whole queuing process and it is a massive blob of people pushing and shoving to get to the screeners. However, as these individuals try to push up to the front, several other Italians raise the alarm. The ones pushing to the front state they are late for the 0700 to Catania flight, which I am also on and, evidently a lot of other people in front and behind me. After a brief exchange of words to the effect of, ‘hey ass wipe! Were on the same flight get the hell in the back of the line!’ or so it seemed as it was in Italian and rather heated, they retreated to the back of the line. So I get to the screener at 0640, there are three screeners and I am at the center one. First problem, my warning triangles are made of plastic and solid steel rods that form the support and they decide they need to check to see if they can go through. Que Jeopardy music.

After about 3 minutes I am told nope, can’t take em. Problem is they won’t let me leave them at the security point but insist I go back to the check in station and have this plastic encased warning triangle put through as ‘checked’ luggage. Tried to just leave it with them but they were having none of that. CRAP! So I RUN to the check in counter, they do a call, tag my triangle kit, put a sticker on my boarding pass to claim it and then I RUN back to security.

Well, the line is gone, they have shut down two of the screening areas the one on the left and the center one I went through earlier. So now I go through the right side screener. “sir, is this your bag?” NOW WHAT?! “do you have scissors?” What? No I don’t have any scissors! “can we please look in your bag?” Sure!

Remember the med kit? Well, it has scissors. Why didn’t I know this? Because I never opened it and it doesn’t have an inventory on it but, they are medical scissors. You know the type, rounded tips so they don’t injure the patient if your cutting away clothing or a band aid. So now they have to find out if they are allowed; it is now 0650. They screener asks, “what time is your flight?” I tell him 0700 he says, “oh, you have plenty of time.” Sure if you say so.

Well after 5 minutes they still haven’t gotten a supervisor to tell the guy whether or not the scissors are OK or not. Again I tell him, ‘hey you can keep the scissors, I really don’t care!’ Nope, he wants a supervisor. At about this time the original dumbass from the check in counter comes running up to the security checkpoint, “Mr. Aki?!” I say yes and he says, “quick, you must hurry!” I look at him, I look at the security checker and say, rather loudly and emphatically, “I am trying to hurry! Tell him [security checker] that!!”

The counter clerk looks at me then at the security bubba and then back at me…he is at a loss. The security guy finally decides to make a decision WITHOUT his supervisor and says, “its OK” and we put the scissors back in the med kit, stuff it in the back pack and I take off at a run with the counter clerk.

Oh did I forget to mention this is a small airport so to get on the airplane you get on a bus that takes you to the plane and then you get on the plane? Well, the busses are done. So we get to the gate, it is 0700 by this time, and a little car with the yellow light pulls up. They stuff me in the car and we go zipping around the airfield to the airplane where I jump out and run up the stairs. So now everyone is looking at me as I make my way to my seat, don’t really care since I have miraculously NOT missed the plane.

As it was, we still landed in Catania early. I never did get my warning triangles back when I got to Catania.

Thus ends the first part of this tale, more to follow as time permits.

[stephenaki]

Part 4, Catania to Messina.

Important thing you should know about Italy that I did not at the time but do now; blue direction signs mean main road, NOT Autostrada. Green signs signify the Autostrada. Why is this important? Because, if you follow the blue signs you wind up going through every single small town on the way! If you get up on the Autostrada, you bypass them; this is the difference of say a one-hour drive versus a 4-hour drive to go 60 miles. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif)

I will say that it was rather fun driving the twisty and curvy roads on the coastline route to Messina unfortunately, this was only between towns and not near long enough. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif) The problems really started as I got closer to Messina and the beach towns became more prevalent. The coast road would take up along the mountainside and then drop you down into the smaller coastal towns and, in several towns, put you within 100 meters of the ocean.

When this happened you would wind up running through little tiny streets that barely fit two cars and in a couple of towns, travel down cobblestone roads that would rattle the living hell out of you if you drove more than 25 MPH. I also had to deal with slow drivers sight seeing on the beach roads and speed bumps every 200 meters in several towns.

At one point, I got stuck behind a local bus for about 10 miles and what should have taken 10 minutes took 45 minutes as it frequently stopped along the route. Now when I say it stopped, I don’t mean to let people on or off, that happened as well but, it stopped because the road was so narrow with cars parked on both sides that it could no longer move forward due to on-coming traffic. He had to wait until the opposing traffic either backed up or moved onto the tiny sidewalk so he could move forward. Talk about frustrating!! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ar15.gif)

I also had a couple of areas that I had to deal with road construction and no one directing traffic. Remember, I headed out at 1500 with the intent of getting to Messina at 1600 to catch a ferry across to Villa San Giovanni. At around 1700, I am still 25 miles from Messina, the sky is getting dark and there is a spattering of rain. In the distance I can see storm clouds over what I am assuming is Messina. Well, the rain is holding off but it is getting dark so I turn on the head lights; no problem, they come on and I make sure I don’t have the high beams on.

I finally hit the outskirts of Messina at around 1800 and start seeing signs to the port and even signs that have little cars in the boats for the ferry! OK, it sucks that it took me so long to get here but I see the light at the end of the tunnel…or so I thought.

As I get into Messina proper I hit Los Angeles type traffic jams! The roads were packed with cars and people and I never got over 10 mph at any given point. About 30 minutes into my stop and go travel through Messina, the headlights quit working and, it starts to drizzle. Just great, now I have no lights and no wipers and I am straining to see the signs to make sure I don’t miss a turn to the port. At least there are plenty of city lights and other car lights that help me see where I am going.

About 5 more minutes and I see a sign that directs me to turn right OR go straight but both have the little boat with the car in them. I turn right. Wrong answer. I go down a road and over a bridge then hang a left at the end of the road. I can’t find squat! Ok, lets back track and see what I would have found had I turned right, still nothing but darkness and what appear to be unoccupied warehouses. Mind you, when I turned down this road the only light I had was my parking lights and the few streetlights that were on this route. The main roads had plenty of light but this was NOT a main road.

Although my lights went out, I was determined to get on the ferry and get off Sicilia. I planned on getting over to Villa San Giovanni and, once there, finding a hotel for the night since I no longer had headlights. Well, that plan kinda went to hell and a hand basket when I couldn’t find the port. So, I pull over, turn on the GPS and set it up to find a hotel. Bingo! There are several close by.

I find a place to park up from the first hotel and walk down to it; no room at the inn! Crap. Walk back to the car, turn on the GPS and look for another hotel. As I drive to the other hotel I find them on the side road I turned down to go to what I thought was the port. OK, drive to the end of the road, do a U-turn and pull up on the sidewalk with everyone else so I can walk to the hotel. Did I mention the car doors won’t lock?
I find myself a hotel about 100 meters from where I park that has a free breakfast and a restaurant inside. It is now 2000. The clerk does not speak much English however; a hotel employee comes in that does speak English very well. She explains to me how to get to the port and, come to find out, I was only about 3 miles from it but, it was not down the road I thought it was.

So I call it a night and head off to bed. Unfortunately I did not get a good nights sleep as my mind was spinning out of control with self-recrimination. At Mid-night I awoke to use the bathroom and as I lay down again, mind begins to spin again, CRASH, FLASH, BOOM! PATTER, PATTER, PATTER…Thunderstorm hits. Well, on the positive side, it will wash all the salt off the car. On the negative side, this will suck if it doesn’t blow over in the morning! As I try to sleep a thought pops into my head…”would it be a bad thing if someone stole the car? Hmm, the doors won’t lock….”

We will leave this tale here and pick up the final chapter tomorrow. On the bright side, the car has been picked up from Italy and should be at the repair shop around mid-month.

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