It’s the final day.
We awoke and, while the boys ate breakfast, began to clean and organize before getting dressed to head out on one final excursion. We had some extra euros in cash burning a hole in our pocket and some souvenirs and gifts we still wanted to get for ourselves and others. Also, we had researched some gelato places that were supposed to be really good that we wanted to try.
We left our apartment and made our way up into Trestavere to where the gelato place was. Unfortunately, it was closed until noon, which complicated things. We went to a playground we’d found on a previous day to regroup. After sitting and the boys playing for a few minutes, we decided to start walking around to see if we saw any good shops and to see if any lunch places were open before noon.
There was no luck on the lunch front, but we did find a couple cool little shops with some gift type items that we explored. Meandering through the streets and alleys, we were beginning to get more and more sentimental of leaving, and also more and more hungry. Thankfully, right as it turned noon, we passed a small restaurant with a line outside. I recognized the name, so we decided to wait in line and we got a table.
The restaurant is called Da Enzo al 29 and we sat down outside. It was a traditional restaurant serving traditional Roman food. We ordered a bread and olive oil and a fried artichoke for the table, cacio e pepe for Allison, carbonara for me, and meatballs for the boys. I’m glad we serendipitously came along this restaurant at the right time because the food was delicious and it was one of the best meals we ate at a restaurant in our whole time in Italy. Everything was tasty and high quality, and the service was attentive (finally!).
After lunch, unfortunately we didn’t have time to backtrack to the new gelato place because I had to get back for work. I had a crazy jampacked work day ahead and I even had to take a call as we walked back to our neighborhood and our old standby gelato shop. The boys were glad they got gelato, regardless of where it was from.
Back at the apartment, I went to work for a pretty grueling, yet productive day. Allison took a much needed nap when the boys did and, once they woke up, she started preparing for our departure by cleaning and tidying. We all had to take COVID tests for our return, so Allison helped the boys one by one take theirs. Beren was such a great big brother and said he would go first to show Silas it wasn’t scary. After he did his, he explained to Silas what to expect and that it would be easy. Once Silas took his test, Beren celebrated with him that he did such a good job.
Once dinnertime came, she ran and picked up a few pizzas for the last time from Pizzeria Remo. We ate together during one of my breaks before I went back to work. My day finished at 11 PM and we set to packing and final cleaning. By about half past midnight, we were finally in bed.
The next morning we woke up early and made final preparations. As always, it was remarkable to see the apartment return to it’s pre-us state. At around 8:30 AM we got a text from our driver who was waiting outside. We bit the apartment a fond farewell and walked out through the rain to the car. In our whole time in Italy, it had never rained on us until this last day as we headed to the airport.
Our driver was kind and gracious, and helped us with our bags when we arrived at the airport. Once inside, we were blessed by a very smooth process. I got to hand it to Delta, they allow you to load up all your test results and forms into an app which expedited the check in process and made it seamless. Making it though security was also easy and soon we were in the terminal waiting.
Since the check in process went so well, we had a few hours to spare waiting. We got some food and then the boys played in a little kids area for a while, while Allison and I took turns offloading our final euros in cash in the duty free stores.
Finally, we made our way through a few more checks and to our gate and onto our plane. On the plane we settled in. Originally the flight plan said it would be an 11 hour and 30 minute flight, so we were pleased when they said it would actually only be a little over 10 hours. Hooray!
Everything started off well with us all watching movies and such. I figured a couple hours in the boys would nap, then wake up for a bit, and then nap again before landing. This did not happen and they just stayed up. Beren had to go the bathroom what seemed like every hour. With eight hours down and two left to go, the boys succumbed to sleep. It was about time because they were both getting a little saucy in their tiredness.
All was well until Beren started squirming in his sleep and had to go potty again. He awoke disgruntled and went to the bathroom, but upon his return, wanted all the space to himself and began to throw a tired fit. In his fit, he kicked and hit a tray table with a full cup of coffee on it that splattered all over a sleeping Silas who awoke shrieking. Allison scooped him up and wiped him off to make sure he was ok. Thankfully he was. The coffee was everywhere, but we were able to sop most of it up with some of the spare pillows and blankets we had (sorry airplane crew).
After way too long sitting in uncomfortable chairs watching tiny movie screens with tiny people squirming around us, we landed in Atlanta. We deplaned and went through customs, exhausted.
Allison’s mom had come up and offered to pick us up from the airport and wake up with the boys for a few days while we recovered. My sister joined us for dinner and brought us some Mexican food from our favorite place, which we had been craving. It was so great to see familiar faces again and to talk about the trip and all that had been going on since we’d been gone.
At about 9 PM after giving the boys a bath, we all ended up going to bed. I did the calculation and we had been up for about 22 hours straight. It was a long day after a long trip, but we did it. It was good to be home.