Friday March 12

We have been told that we were affected by a national Italian transportation strike! A one day strike just for us... What a day. Our overnight flight was uneventful. It seemed every time we looked at the flight progress it was still 5 hours and 19 minutes to arrival in Frankfurt, but eventually we did get there just after 8 a.m. in Germany. We were loaded on a bus to go to a different terminal which took forever, then into a line to try and figure out where our next gate was, etc. As we were rushing to make our connection to Milan, we had to go through security again, that took forever. I realized that we were never going to make it! So we looked at my boarding pass for the connecting flight and it said I was to go to B 09. So we are rushing to this gate in a whole different terminal. We got to B 09 and there was absolutely no one there; no people, no airline employees, no one. So we looked at someone else's boarding pass, and they were scheduled to leave at A11! I mentioned it would have been nice to know they had something different than I did on their boarding passes. So....we all rushed off to A11. Some flight to an unknown place. We finally found the help section for Lufthansa, not an easy thing to do. To cut to the chase, we had been placed on different flights when we checked in at Philadelphia, but the flight crew had never mentioned to me that our connecting flight had been cancelled! They just stuck us on whatever flight was next, and then actually two different flights. Two of our group didn't even get put on another flight. After much angst and standing in line, we were given a 10 euro voucher for lunch at the airport, and figured out what to do next. We went back to that very quiet B 09 and slept off and on all afternoon. Three of us boarded a 5 o'clock flight to Milan and the rest went off to find a bite to eat and A11 for a 10:50 flight. Here's the next piece of info - we were arriving at different airports in MIlan! The three earlier fliers (My sister Diane, her husband John and I) waited at the Linate airport for other groups to come in who had also been affected by the strike. Had a bit of supper at the deli-type cafeteria. Finally, about 11:30 P.M. We loaded a bus and headed for Venice - a 4 hour trip! The other group was to be at the hotel when we got there. We arrived at the Hotel Germania around 2:30 a.m. but the rest of our group was not there. They pulled in around 4 a.m. Our wake-up call was at 6 a.m. No rest for us!!! After a very short night - we were up and off to Venice for the day. Riding our bus, then a water taxi to the City. We were grateful for the leisurely pace of seeing Venice, walking about, riding gondolas, seeing the sights. It seems surreal to know that we have seen this famous city.