So, that was the plan when we left for Rome. After the attacks, I decided that I didn't really want to spend that much time at the Termini metro station (having to wait in line to store our baggage, going back there to retrieve our stuff and then waiting for the shuttle to take us to the airport). Even if it meant it would cost us a lot more, I just felt more comfortable taking the airport shuttle.
I remembered that I had contacted a cheap airporter before we left, however because our flight arrived late they couldn't pick us up. I contacted them again once deciding that we wanted to take the shuttle after all to get back to the airport via email for a hotel pick-up at 7pm and they were available and for all of us they only charged 40E! I was a little worried as I only spoke with them via email, but I figured that it left us enough time to get a taxi if we needed to at the last minute.
So, we had one last awesome breakfast at the hotel...
We left our luggage at the hotel storage and just took one stroller and one backpack for the day. We bought our tickets and headed out to Ostia Antica. Even though it is considered a "day trip" from Rome, Ostia Antica was really easy to get to. Ostia Antica is a very well preserved archaeological site that 2,000 years ago was ancient Rome's seaport, a thriving commercial center of 60,00 people.
There's the Davis Archaeological Team!
Pushing the stroller through the path was a bit of a pain... Another reason we only brought one stroller today.
Impressive Theatre!
Veena loved exploring the ruins!
I had read that the Pyramide stop, which is where we had to get off to transfer to the Metro, had a pyramid right outside the station. We peeked our heads outside and sure enough, there it was. It is apparently 1 of only 2 built in Ancient Rome and the only one that stands today.
We headed back towards the hotel. By the time we got to the metro stop near our hotel it was only about 4pm, so we had plenty of time to spare. We went in search of Gelato.
Found it!
Then we walked back towards the hotel after picking up some sandwiches on the way.
Outside the hotel.
We had a few hours to spare when we got to the hotel. I tried to persuade the older kids to take a nap while I let Veena roam.
This was Daniel's idea of helping me with the kids...
I finally got them to take a nap about 30 minutes before the shuttle was due to pick us up. I got them ready with fresh sweaters, had them use the restroom and packed up the things that we wouldn't need on the plane. At 6:45pm I started waiting for the shuttle. At about 7:05 I started to get a little worried, but luckily for me the shuttle driver called the front desk. He said that the shuttle would be late, arriving at 7:30pm and was that still okay. Yes, it was. I was happy to have heard from him, knowing he was in fact on his way. Also, since we requested the shuttle to arrive much earlier than we needed, I wasn't stressed. Some advice: Always schedule things ahead of time, that way you won't be stressed if they are late.
The shuttle driver came, we got in and to our surprise we were the only ones he was picking up, so we went straight to the airport! He was a very nice shuttle driver and was good with the kids. I happily handed him his 40E once we got to the airport and off we went to find our place to check in. We were there about 8pm, so had plenty of time to spare.
Funny thing was, in the end I don't think we actually would have saved much money doing it the other way. I figure, we would need to store our bags at termini (6E per bag for up to 5 hours... we had 2 plus a stroller so 18E, 6E each for the terra vision shuttle (kids under 5 free, so 18E) for a total of 36E, only 4E cheaper than the shuttle that picked us up from the hotel! Plus we would have had to wait to store our luggage (had read that the lines to both deposit and pick up can be very long at termini) and would have had to lug all the suitcases and the strollers and the kids in the metro. That wouldn't have been so fun.
We got to the airport around 8pm and the ticket counter wasn't open yet, so we waited. While we were waiting I noticed this strange looking man walk straight to the left side of the counter and was standing behind a pillar (where we couldn't see him). I thought maybe he was waiting for the ticket counter to open. After about 30 minutes of waiting, the ticket counter opened and we got in line. The guy was still there, but now that I was near the counter I could see him better. He had just two backpacks, one which was on the floor and the other that was on his back. It looked like he was charging his phone. But he looked so suspicious! Why was he standing behind the pillar, why did he pick this outlet to charge his phone (he obviously wasn't checking in for this flight)? I got very nervous. I showed Daniel the guy, but he wasn't nervous at all. I was. I wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible. I was probably overreacting due to the recent attacks at the airport in Brussels, but still the guy seemed out of place.
We checked in. The ticket guy made us take the pack n play to "oversized items." I tried to tell him that we always just check the item and it hasn't been a problem, but he wouldn't let us. He said, "I can't, its a stroller." I tried to tell him it wasn't a stroller but he wasn't having it. So we had to walk all the way to the oversized area to drop off our "fragile stroller" that wasn't even a stroller at all. It wasn't like we were going to be late for our flight or anything, I just wanted to go through security. I felt safer being past security.
We finally made it to the gate. We waited around for about another hour or so before we were able to board. The kids were up the entire time, which was okay because they fell asleep soon after boarding the flight. Our first leg was Rome to Moscow, where we would have a 7 hour layover. The flight to Moscow was great; kids slept the entire way!
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