Today was a transfer day as Giovanni piloted the bus back to the Classic Hotel in Firenze – the ending point for the tour. We said our goodbyes to Angelica, Gianni, and Giovanni and most of the walkers outside by the bus as the taxis arrived to whisk us all away to different destinations. Jonathan and I shared a taxi to the Santa Maria Novella train station with Glenn and Claire, so our goodbyes happened at the train station.
Our train ticket (for some reason) was good only on the regional trains that stop at every wide spot in the road, so it took us aver 3 1/2 hours to get to Rome, compared to the 1 1/2 hours on the high speed EuroStar. We got to Rome shortly before 1500 and walked to our hotel in about 5 minutes. After dropping our bags in our room we got lunch at a local pizzeria and dropped by an internet café to check emails.
Not much else happening this day, after an afternoon nap, we had dinner at a trattoria around the corner where we chatted with a couple of recent grads from Kenyon College who were traveling around Europe after graduation. There was more English being spoken in the restaurant than Italian and Jonathan wondered aloud about the location of the Italian quarter.