A Day In The Life...

A Week In Review, Part II

After finally boarding in Frankfurt, it was a quick 90 mins to Rome...

We landed at the Leonardo DaVinci Int'l Airport and it wasn't what expected...What I had expected was to see us flying over ancient Rome and maybe catch a glimpse of the Vatican or even the Coliseum. To my suprise, as I looked out the airplane window, all I saw was farmland all around. I thought to myself, Did we make an unscheduled stop? But alas, we were really in Rome...I have no idea how far we were located from downtown Rome. The airport was a complete opposite from Germany's...It was still HUGE but very dirty and somewhat unorganized. Leaks from the ceiling, no air-conditioning, people were rude...and to top everything off, when our flight didnt board at its scheduled time, no one made any announcements...everyone just stood there looking at each other, guessing when our flight might be ready.

After an hour delay, we finally board (at 8:22) and are soon on our way...Just after the sunsets and forty minutes later we land on an island named Olbia (part of Sardinia)...After retreiving my heavy ass bags, I was now on a quest to find someone, anyone, who might know where the hell I was going. I walked a few yards before some guy came up to me and asked if I was American...I was so relieved that someone other than me spoke english I could have hugged the guy...He introduced himself as being a member of the Command Sponsor Team and they usually meet all arriving flights to greet sailors...So we loaded up the gov't van and he proceeded to drive me to where I can catch the ferry (water taxi) to my ship...I asked how far are we from it and he said about an hour...MY JAW DROPPED.

So on we went toward a town called Palau (not the same as the one seen on 'SURVIVOR'). The roads were winding and narrow. Some Italian drivers were crazy enough to pass during a turn...CRAZY ! ! !....When we get to Palau, all i can see a lot of people milling around. The streets are lined with little trinket shops similar to what we would see at Seaport Village. We get to the landing and we wait for the water taxi to come...

Finally, at 11:40pm the water taxi comes by. I'm on my own again since the sponsor lives on a totally different island...the ride takes about 20 mins. Luckily, some shipmates give me a hand carrying my bags onboard where I am greeted by the Engineering Chief on duty...He makes some phone calls an has some duty personnel take my stuff to the berthing...after logging me in as checking onboard, Chief tells me to go get some rest. The rest of the ship is on holiday stand-down until July 5th, so come back on that day....I head over to the berthing and find a rack. I took a nice long shower and pass out for the next 12 hours.........

posted by Frogue @ 7:53 AM