So, being the ridiculously early for everything people we are, we headed to the airport about three hours before our flight… even though we were only required to be 40 minutes early. We arrived at baggage check in, already sure our bags would be slightly over… ahead of us in the queue we noticed some very worried faces, and several groups re-organising their bags, some with a couple of jumpers around their waists. We got to the counter and were told that our bags were 22.5, and 23 kgs each, with a weight limit of 20kgs. We were also told that they would like to charge us 20 euro per kilo over the limit… ahh no thankyou. So like everyone else we began to unpack, and scrutinise everything we own as to decide whether to throw it away or not, or whether we were able to reshuffle our things into our carry on luggage. After throwing out everything we could possibly live without, and multiple attempts at weighing them again, we realised this was not going to be easy… then we decided to do what everyone else seemed to be doing, only on a much larger scale… I put on 6 shirts, a denim skirt over my jeans, with a thermal shirt, jumper and jacket tied around my waist. Sara wore 3 shirts, with two thermals and a jumper around her waist. If we could have worn two pairs of shoes we would have, but I definitely think we started a new ‘airport fashion’. I mean, all the fashion magazines claim that layering your clothes makes you look slimmer, surely the more layers you wear, the slimmer you look right?!? Finally, we managed to both get our bags to 20kgs each and were able to check in.
Our next job was to reshuffle our carry on bag… we had to somehow make our day bags fit into our backpack, which meant again throwing out random bits and pieces we have collected along the way, mainly snacks and then began the line through security. We seem to get singled out at every airport for either a bomb test or just a good pat down. This time Sara was the lucky one, who got frisked on her way through the screen. Next we had to unload almost everything out of our meticulously arranged bags because the technician could not see through everything we had… Sara however, had managed to bring a pencil case, which she had taken out of her main luggage because of the weight. She obviously didn’t think to see what was in it, because the technician found her Swiss army knife, and a pack of gaffa tape… hmm nothing suss! Luckily they let her through, then began unpacking everything in my bag, questioning whether I also had a knife to which I laughed “ha, I wouldn’t be that stupid!”… At last we were let through, minus the knife and gaffa and we were ready to search the screen for our boarding gate… ‘last call, last call’. Awesome! Lucky we got to the airport so early! So we began running to our gate on the other end of the terminal, and made it just in time to join a queue and thankfully were let through with our, probably over the limit, carry on bags.
Ahhh Ryanair, oh how we hate you… not only do they scrutinise every extra kilo you take onto the plane, even though their clients just end up wearing more, and therefore take the same weight on regardless, they also do not allocate seats. So each person gets on and sits wherever they feel like it, which is great when single people choose to have a row to themselves, and couples like Sara and I, are left with whatever we can find. When we got on the plane, the air hostess was having a heart attack at trying to find room for everyone’s carry on luggage, as the over-head lockers were full. This also meant that half the plane was standing in the aisle unable to find a seat without first finding somewhere for their luggage. Sara swiftly found a seat towards the front of the plane, and left me to battle to a seat of my own. Eventually I noticed a spare seat in the centre of a triple row and kindly asked the gentlemen if anyone was sitting there. They replied no, but then the window seat person decided they would like to sit next to their friend in the aisle seat so proceeded to come out into the overcrowded aisle to let me take the window seat, followed by him and his friend… instead of the aisle person just moving over one seat… brilliant. Eventually we were able to take off, and I had a lovely nap for the duration of the flight.
We then arrived in Milan and got on an airport shuttle bus to the central train station. We had booked for a later train but thought we might be able to get the earlier one, seeing as we were making good time. I joined the queue to collect our tickets while Sara waited on the platform with our bags. When I asked if we were allowed to board the earlier train, I was rudely yelled at for not speaking Italian or French and handed my tickets. Still unsure whether we could or not, I ran up to find Sara, grabbed our things and boarded the train with 2 minutes to spare before it departed. Luckily no one checked our tickets, so it didn’t matter. We then arrived in Verona at around 12:30am, exhausted from our taxi, plane, bus and train and decided to get a taxi to our hotel. We had booked at the Holiday Inn, because there were no hostels in Verona, and all the B&B’s required check in before 7pm. At last we were at our new home, starving, but were told all that was available was the packet of fun size of Pringles chips in our mini bar… in the fridge, which we declined and went to bed hungry.
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