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day 114  //  florence  //  pisa  //  london  //  denver  //  rapid city



Today's the day! (Ironic because that's how I started my very first blog post.) After getting ready and packing up the last of my stuff, I lugged each of my massively overweight bags down one-by-one. (I came with one big, overweight bag, one small bag, and a backpack. But I knew I would need more room on the way home so my mom brought me another big bag when she visited over spring break. So I left with 3 rolling bags, one small, and two extremely big and extremely overweight big bags, and my backpack. You should've seen my the to maneuver all of that by myself.) So after I waited outside my door for my taxi, it finally arrived and the driver strugglingly loaded up all my bags. Then it was off to the bus stop, leaving my Florence apartment behind forever. After all the luggage was loaded into the bus (which took a long time) we drove off to the Pisa Airport, enjoying the last little bit of Florence through the window along the way. When we got to the airport, we unloaded and looked absolutely ridiculous as we rolled in our obscene amount of luggage. There were a lot of kids from the program there since AIFS organized all of our flights, so consider that along with the fact that we all had multiple overweight bags - check-in took a lonnnng time. Boy was it a relief to get rid of those bags though. Once we did that, we went through security and grabbed a bite to eat before going to our gate. We didn't wait long before boarding and setting off to London. It was about a 2 hour flight and I slept the whole way. Arriving in London was bittersweet too, because that's where we had to say our final, final goodbyes to last of our friends who were also on the London flight. So the tears were flowing once again as we went though security at Heathrow. And then there were 3! Lex, Karley, and I had tight connection so we grabbed Starbucks and literally ran to our gate and were almost the last ones on the plane. I was supposed to have a window seat but the guy in my row who had the isle seat took the liberty of stealing mine, so I ended up in the isle (aisle?). I didn't really mind, though. We took off and I kicked back and got as comfy as possible for the 9 1/2 hour flight back to the US. (Side-note: it's so nice to hear people speaking English... It was frustrating never knowing what was going on when everyone spoke Italian.) I watched a couple movies, enjoyed a lovely airplane food dinner, and slept. Before I knew it, I was back in the U-S-of-A. So good, but so, so weird. We got our baggage and went through customs pretty painlessly, then Karley and Lexie's families were waiting for us outside the doors. I sat down for an iced tea at a airport restaurant with Lexie's parents for a bit before saying my last goodbye to her and heading off to check in for my last flight of the day (and of the trip). I rechecked my baggage and headed for my gate. We boarded and after a quick flight, I was walking through the door to be greeted my my mom, dad, and Paige. It was seriously the weirdest feeling. I feel like I never left home in the first place, yet I'm sharing all these stories and dropping all these names that they don't know. I don't know how to explain it but in the least cheesy way possible, it feels like it was all just a dream. This moment I had been anticipating for so long (arriving back home) was now here, and it was just to mist bizarre feeling. I was too excited to wait, so right when we got home I had to get out all the gifts/souvenirs. Then Paige and I stayed up forever talking. (Mom wanted us to get some sleep, but we had too much to catch up on.) And then I snuggled in for my first night back in my big, comfy bed. Boy is it good to be home.