Day Nineteen - Jun 9, 2012
Palermo, Sicily to Pisa, Italy
Daily Didactic
The day started slowly with a huge reluctance to leave our digs. Theresa whipped up one last Ballaro Market breakfast and we took a quick walk to our internet hotspot. Franco had been good enough to let us delay our checkout until 2:00 and around that time we walked out through the market and checked our bags at "Left Luggage" in the train station. We initially assumed this train station staple was a lost and found, but have now checked our bags in both Naples and Palermo for the day. It's great for travel days with a gap in the middle. After a positive experience in Naples, we had our eyes on the Palermo Orto Botanico, an enormous garden in the direction of the sea. It turns out down here closer to the equator just about everything grows and grows large. We gazed and wandered for a few hours and then made our way to port to look around before catching a train to the airport. Tonight we were experimenting with Ryanair, one of the super low cost airlines in Europe. They seem to do it by lowballing the ticket and then adding on 10 euro here and 15 euro here (12.50 for "web check in" which we think was mandatory). Our tickets started at 70 euro for both of us, and were over 100 by the time we were done. If we had to check our bags it would have been 50 euro a piece more. Our packs both easily fit in the overheads, though, so we guess two for 100 from Palermo to Pisa sounds like a deal. The other fun thing about Ryanair is that it costs for assigned seating, so the whole boarding event is pretty competitive queuing. We managed to end up first in line (dumb luck we were at the wrong gate and they changed boarding to it at the last moment), got seats together, and enjoyed a bumpy ride to Pisa. We caught a cab and were to our B&B just before midnight. Quite a day.
Today's Photos
