Rome- Part 1

Ever since we found out we couldn't drive our car to Rome, Steve has been searching for an inexpensive way to get us down there. He talked to his coworkers about how to find airfare deals and hotels and everything. He took there advice and planned the whole weekend. He really did an amazing job. Everything was great!

On Friday, we headed to a little airport about an hour from Stuttgart. After checking in and passing security, all stress-free I might add, we found a little children play place by our gate. This was wonderful! It made the 2 hours go by so fast! Zack and Josh loved playing! Every airport NEEDS one of these!

Zack loved flying the airplane.

He even let Josh get in and play with him.

There were big Legos. Zack really liked building towers. Josh liked bum scooting around in them.

There was also a TV playing little parts of several different kid movies, like Jungle Book, Toy Story, Dalmatians, Cars, etc. They were all movies that we did not put our our laptop for Zack to watch. Zack noticed the movies and exclaimed "Mommy, Mommy! I haven't seen this in a long, loong, loooong time!" He was so excited. It was pretty cute. After a while of standing in front of the TV, he said "I need a seat." Then he grabbed a little chair and sat down. I think he will like being home next week with all of his toys and movies.

Soon it was time to board the plane. First we got on one of these.

This drove us to the plane. We got out of the bus and had to walk over to the plane. Then we walked up the stairs right into the plane. I thought this was really cool. I had never had to do this before. It was a fun way to get on the plane. Zack could actually see the big plane and could tell we were getting on it. I thought it was pretty cool.

The flight was short, only about 1 hour and 10 minutes. The boys were both great on the plane. We are hoping this is a preview of our long 13 hour flight home. At least we can hope!

Steve used the USO to set up a driver to pick us up from the airport and take us to our hotel. We met this guy right outside of the airport. He was really nice. He even had a car seat for Josh. He just didn't know how to install it properly. Josh LOVED facing forward. Zack LOVED not having a car seat, until he was sliding all over the seat around every turn. At one point, I thought he was going to loose his lunch. The driver was a little crazy. He honked at everyone and would say something in Italian to them under his breath. Sometimes he even yelled at them in Italian. We were very happy when we arrived at our hotel all in one piece.

We checked in to our hotel. Then we went to the restaurant next door for some real Italian food. We ordered some pasta and pizza. It was so delicious. The pasta sauce was amazing. We don't know if we can ever eat Olive Garden pasta again. It is just not the same.

After enjoying our wonderful dinner, we headed for bed. We knew we needed a good nights rest so we could tour Vatican City on Saturday!