Our feet are back in OZ

Well, we are home - after a fantastic and energetic trip to Italy - nearly 5 weeks. Landed in Brisbane Airport early yesterday morning - must say it all seems to work very well. We picked up our bags quickly, went through the "I have something to declare" gate (always do, just in case), and then found our way to the International platform of the Brisbane train system. Just so easy, put our bags on a trolley at pick up, after customs wheeled them over, put them in an elevator down to the platform, train came (every half hour to Robina) loaded/wheeled them on the train, and the last part of our trip started. Ah, but half way home to Robina we received a phone call from Emirates - requesting us to look at our bags - yep, we had picked up an identical one to mine (never seen another one like it before), and of course mine (with the tartan ribbon on handle) was somewhere else. Anyway, it was all resolved with a couple of telephone conversations, the lady (Cathy) who picked up mine, didn't realise till she arrived home (fortunately in Brisbane) and asked her husband, (who hadn't travelled with her) to take the bag into their house. His comment was, gee even though Emirates let you take 30 kgs, this one is heavier, and then to his great amusement, he chanted "hey dear, guess what - it is not even yours!!" So this morning we drove half way to Brisbane, and the "chanting husband" met us and we exchanged these vibrant red bags - and of course Cathy's bag's weight was easily as heavy as Liz's bag weight! Lesson learned - double check your bag's identification...

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Of course, before we left Pienza in Tuscany for Rome Airport, we spent some time making sure we packed correctly, all liquids and sharp items went into "check in" bags. However, we overlooked the special Amalfi bottle of Lemoncillo we had bought for our neighbours who looked after our garden - packed that in my carry on for safety purposes, and Frank forgot his little "scanpan" scissors in our prescription medicine bag!!. On entering Rome airport - we were caught!!! The scissors were signed off and into the "bad bin", as did the nicely packed bottle of Lemoncillo, but then the Officer seemed to take some pity on me (which I didn't request, because I realised how stupid I had been at this stage), and she requested that I could carry it with me on the flight - yes, was the answer. Great, I thought, BUT then we reached Dubai, and back through security again - this time I really expected to lose our little liquid gift - and was okay with this, we would just have to pick up another "more impersonal" bottle in duty free. My bag went through, the man checking out the goods on the camera wasn't even looking at the screen of contents, and my "bag with bottle" just flowed through so to speak - and now it is home in one piece - ready to be passed on to the boys for their great help while we were away, but not until we can relay their bottle's international security journey to them!

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Dropping off the Car in Rome - interesting, but really not that hard, and then this morning the Brig wanted to drive our little Subaru on the other side of the road, and try it as a "manual shift", and my little girl is automatic - that didn't last for long though, that's for sure.

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I have added some photos to our first day in Italy below, and will start working through the rest of the "pics" as time goes on.