The one with the missing hotel (Rome)

How we felt about our missing hotel

The journey to Rome was a fairly easy one. We only had to take one train, but it was too good to last. I had already looked up the directions from the train station to the hotel, so we headed straight there. We found the address with little difficulty; the only problem is there was no hotel there. We went to the hotel next door to ask, but they didn't know anything. I wondered if maybe it was one of those things where it was actually around the corner, so we walked around the surrounding blocks to see if we were just missing it. When that search turned up no results, we decided to return to the train station to see if the information desk could find anything about it online. The woman there tried to be helpful, but she couldn't find a phone number and suggested that we go back and ring all the doorbells to see if it was an apartment that we had missed. We lugged our suitcases back, and I tried out a mix of Spanish/Italian to try to ask the residents to no avail.

At that point, we decided to give up. We headed to a cafe with Internet to try to find somewhere to stay for at least the night, frustrating as it was. We drank some cappuccinos and contemplated our doom, trying to find a hotel. It was especially difficult because many of the hotels were booked or had increased their prices because of New Year's. Finally we found a promising hotel but were reluctant to book online again. It wasn't too far, so we decided to walk over and investigate. Thank goodness we did, because we got to the hotel, and they said that they were booked! Thoroughly dejected at this point, we stopped in at another hotel in the same building to see if they at least had something for the night. By some miracle, they had an availability for that night only, but we gladly accepted and settled in, using the Internet to try and find something for the rest of our time in Rome.

After much effort, we found a place that was along a metro line and acceptable, hotel Laura. We had site-seeing plans for the day, but the whole ordeal had left us exhausted and out of time. We decided to hang out in our room until dinner and regroup. For dinner we split a pizza and picked up some fruit at the market. It had been a long day, but at least, I feel secure in the knowledge that we handled the situation calmly and capably. After this year, I'll be ready for anything!!