DAY 1 - May 6, 2014 - Arrivederci!!!!

We were off for our Italian Wedding Adventure. Mom, Joann and Bryan were our travel buddies. Our flight was set for an on-time departure which was great since most of our guests who were already in Europe had experienced some major travel delays. With only a minor delay of 30 minutes, due to Newark having one of their runways closed we were off. Our pilot informed us he was a retired military fighter pilot and like to fly fast. It must have been true because he made up the delay and we landed with a very "FAST & FIRM" landing in Newark on time.

The 5 of us had time for a nice lunch before catching our connecting flight to Milan. We boarded on time, but ended up sitting on the tarmack for 2 hours while we waited for someone to bring the pilot a headset. I thought all pilots had their own headsets, but apparently that is not the case. I watched an entire movie while the plane sat there. When we finally landed in Milan, we had another 1 hour delay. The flight crew could not get the jet bridge attached to the plane so we all had to wait while they fixed it. The pilot apologized for all the annoyances. 

We were now 3 hours behind schedule. I had padded our arrival time in Varenna so we could meet up with our guests that afternoon, but the issues with the plane derailed it. Oh well, at least we were all there safely. With all our stuff loaded into 2 rental cars, we were off to Varenna!