I thought it would be easy enough to slide our Italy vacation from July to October. After all, our travel days would stay the same, the length of the trip would be identical and it should be an even nicer time to go because October weather will be more favorable than July. I’d already done the research of the best areas to stay in each city, studied the train tables, determined connections and times between cities, and memorized the closed/open rotation of the major sites (Vaitcan closed on Sundays, state museums closed Mondays, Colosseum open every day, etc). Easy — gather it all up, flip the calendar a few months and plant ourselves down in the first 2 weeks of October, just as if the deployment had never happened.
Until I went to check our dates for lodging. It turns out that everyone loves October in Italy. The hotels and apartments that I had reserved for our first trip not only were booked for the particular days that I had planned to spend in those cities, but they were each booked for the entire two week trip. In addition, our friends who live in Italy, who we were hoping to see, have family coming for . . . you guessed it, the exact 2 weeks of our trip. Add in that all the hotel/apartment rates are more expensive in what is now the “high season,” and finding both affordable and available accommodations with short notice started to look like an impossibility.
So scratch Italy for now. I’ll keep that trip tucked in my back pocket until a better time presents itself. It’s not like Venice is going anywhere (except for the sinking into the sea part!) But we ARE going on vacation. The kids have Eid vacation the first week of October and we are taking them out of school for the second week. The plan has become Crete. Does that sound random to you? The military (space-Available, FREE) flight that we’re planning on taking makes stops at Crete and Naples before heading on to Virginia. The choice was made for us, but after seeing sights like these, our new destination hardly seems like a sacrifice.
Incredible Crete Spot (5min) from Incredible Crete on Vimeo.
I’m changing things up and have reserved a rental car in advance (because we need one that will fit all 6 of us and Crete is known for its loads of micro-compact European cars), but nothing else. No hotels, no reservations, no plan. We’re going to pack swimsuits, hiking shoes, sunscreen, and sweatshirts and see what happens.