Day 0 - Travelling to Mestre

Today was the start of 2 weeks holiday in Italy, travelling around a few cities and, hopefully, having fun and taking in the culture.

I went out for a few drinks on a work do last night, so I went to bed a bit late and, for some reason, woke up about 5.30.  I tried getting back to sleep but then the boys' alarm went off at 6 - Luke had set it an hour earlier than he meant to, by accident.  Of course, they were both excited about going away and were chattering loudly, so I ended up getting up with them at 6.30, pretty tired - not the best start.

Still, the flight wasn't til 2.30 and we weren't planning to leave until 11.30, so it left us plenty of time to pack and weight the bags (every Kg counts with Ryanair). We actually left a bit early - something of a miracle for us - and got to the airport in good time.

We decided to use the valet parking service this time, which was £40 more but definitely worth it because from getting out of the car to getting through check-in and security only took half an hour, which must be a record for a family of four with 2 kids under 10.

Of course, we decided to eat at the airport AND stop for comics/mags and sweets at WHSmith, so despite our good start, we were almost last onto the plane, fighting for a seat!  The flight itself was pretty average, but I thought the Alps were impressive.  I must have flown over them a few times, but I don't remember them being as snow covered and as vast as they looked today - provided a great view for a while.

Then it was off the plane, just made the bus to Mestre about 60 seconds before it left the airport (would've had to wait another hour otherwise) and a walk to the hotel, which turned out to be pretty nice, before dinner and bed, exhausted.