Italy is Amazing But How Are We Getting Home?

Saturday, October 13, 2018
Bergamo, Lombardy, Italy
Friday and Saturday were busy.  On Friday after breakfast we realized for the millionth time that we should have listened to our Mom and found out from the front desk that we could buy a 10 punch bus ticket from the Tabachi store across the street for about 10 Euro. The C1 and C2 bus stopped on the main road and went to the Ospedale in about 10 minutes. DUH. So, we did that and within 20 minutes we were at the hospital having spent a little more than a buck, but of course, no handsome taxi driver. When we got there we gave Mom a contraband brie on bread sandwich which she promptly enjoyed although she claimed to feel a bit guilty about it. She was starting to feel a bit antsy now, getting tired of the food and she had been moved to another room with a patient who had monitors beeping all night long. Not sleeping well was wearing on Mom and she started asking about getting discharged. She was told by the nurses, "oh no, not possible," because the doctors wouldn't be there over the weekend.
We then met the very lovely PT lady who was making sure Mom looked spiffy for her walk up and down the hallway with the walker. With a lot of help from Google translate we were able to coach Mom - the PT wanted her to exaggerate her steps going "heel-toe" and to lift her knee a little higher. Her left step drifted into the center so she had to look at her feet to make sure it was going straight. I took video of Mom walking and I'm so glad I did! I was able to show her what they wanted her to do and over time, her gait improved so much. The exercise was good but exhausting so after what Mom said was a pretty good lunch, we were instructed to go have some fun again so she could rest.  
At this point, we were of course relieved that Mom was feeling good and starting to walk around with assistance. We still had no idea when she would be discharged and the nurses had indicated that we should assume Mom would have to wait several weeks and preferably a month to fly. Mom was still pretty weak and fatigued even though her tests were looking good and she was on limited meds. 
Originally Mom had told me to look for a beautiful hotel in the Lake country where she could recuperate and Karen and I could enjoy ourselves. The ideas and plans changed frequently as we got new information, as Mom became more "with it" and as we got our bearings in the hospital and the city. We discussed a few options but nothing firm, and it was still hard for Mom to really focus on all the details. The challenge of finding wheelchair accessible places was new - basically it was all new and in a foreign language! So, we just were taking it day by day.  
We told her we probably wouldn't be back that evening because we were on a mission to buy a wheelchair and a walker. All our initial ideas about an exit strategy involved wheels for her so we wanted to take care of that first. We missed the store the first time we went because there is a pretty widespread 12:30-3:00 siesta period in Bergamo for many stores.
We expertly caught the bus back then went to Nessi, a pizza place Karen discovered the first day that has beautiful sandwiches, pastries and the best pizza ever. SO many kinds of pizza!  And, of course since we needed to wait for the orthopedic store to open, we went back to the street fair and in our wandering came upon a beautiful old shopping street modeled after the old city. I won't say it was the most important discovery of the trip but pretty high up there was the little store front with the simple words, "Shoes No Box. All leather, all $33." We spent a WHOLE bunch of time (and euros!) in there....
Later, we succeeded in buying not only a lightweight narrow profile wheelchair, but a Swiss engineered walker that rolls like a dream. As you can see, excellent for also carrying purchases. We shlepped everything to the hotel - barely - (Karen almost flipped over the walker in the streets of Bergamo as she wildly raced with it on the cobblestones) and as we walked on the main street, we passed a travel agency. Now because we were operating under the assumption that flying was out of the question, we have to be forgiven for the next part of the story.
We are under the assumption that Mom cannot fly for a while because altitude is bad, can trigger another stroke, and the best thing to do is to avoid long flights and a lot of up and down. Mom's original flight home was on Oct. 24th through Rome, Karen's was on the same airline. If it's true that she has to wait at least 3 weeks to a month then we could wait until around then, reroute both their flights through Milan and just buy one ticket for me. OR, we could go talk to Giovanni and Alessandro (yes they were quite handsome but THAT IS IRRELEVANT!) and see if there are any cruises that could take us to the U.S. I mean if we have to wait around, we might as well get on a cruise right away, eliminate one of the legs up in the air at altitude, and then just take a flight from wherever we land on the east coast all the way home because by then it will have been three weeks! There are cruises leaving from London that get to New York in a week! There must be all kinds of cruises! Now doesn't that make perfect sense?! 
We thought so, and the two very helpful travel agents worked very hard for almost two hours, right up to closing time at 7 PM when we swiped the credit card and committed to a cruise beginning in less than a week's time (gee I really hope she gets discharged by then...) that would start in Barcelona (well all we have to do is get there, we can do that right?) and sails for two weeks to Fort Lauderdale. Awesome!
We celebrated by going to a local joint and trying the Bergamo specialty - polenta.  The dinner was good and the polenta with cheese (this is a small side order which we barely dented) was tasty but like a giant fat bomb. We slept well! 
More fun photos below...
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