{"id":5260,"date":"2025-11-29T12:13:31","date_gmt":"2025-11-29T16:13:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/?p=5260"},"modified":"2025-11-29T12:13:31","modified_gmt":"2025-11-29T16:13:31","slug":"st-luke-pilgrimage-to-italy-day-1-november-10th-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/?p=5260","title":{"rendered":"St. Luke Pilgrimage to Italy, Day 1 \u2014 November 10th, 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Monday, November 10, we \u00a0and the other trip participants arrived at St. Luke Church \u00a0in Westport, Connecticut, at noon. The final member of the group to arrive was Fr. Kumar, who was working until the last minute. \u00a0One group member, Donna, had made arrangements for two vans to pick us up and take us to JFK Airport, Terminal 4, Delta Airlines.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Nick and I were familiar with the heavy traffic in Queens caused by a massive multi-year construction project, a work that has been \u00a0in progress for several years. However, many of the other trip participants \u00a0were struck by the challenges this project was causing to us and so many others who were on their way to JFK. A construction worker was holding up a sign that said “SLOW.” As if \u00a0there were any other choice!<\/p>\n

Eventually we reached Terminal 4. Instead of pulling over, though, our driver passed the terminal \u00a0and continued driving away from it. We were \u00a0approaching \u00a0Exit signs \u00a0and others \u00a0that were directing us back to Connecticut! Fr. Kumar, who was in the other van, \u00a0called Donna to find out what had happened to our van. His group \u00a0was already entering the airport. Then our driver realized his error and had us back on the road to Terminal 4.<\/p>\n

When Nick and \u00a0I were at the \u00a0airport in New Orleans, a pilot saw me trying to manage my luggage and said, “Let me help you.” That does not happen in New York! Soon we were inside the terminal and were catching up with the group that had been in the other van.<\/p>\n

I prefer an aisle seat in airplanes so that I don’t have to climb over anyone when I want to \u00a0get up. This time we were not able to choose our own seats and had taken the ones that were assigned to us. Nick had the window seat, I was in the middle, and a young fellow joined us in our row in the aisle seat. He was Yogi, our tour escort. During the flight we \u00a0exchanged many thoughts about flying including our favorite destinations. I learned that Yogi was the son of Angela and Peter, the managers \u00a0of Nuovo Tours.<\/p>\n

For dinner, we had the option \u00a0of meat balls or pasta. We were on our way to Italy, where we expected to find lots of delicious pasta, so we chose meat balls. Day 1 ended while we were up in the air, looking forward to our upcoming adventures in Italy.<\/p>\n

8,621 steps<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Monday, November 10, we \u00a0and the other trip participants arrived at St. Luke Church \u00a0in Westport, Connecticut, at noon. The final member of the group to arrive was Fr. Kumar, who was working until the last minute. \u00a0One group member, Donna, had made arrangements for two vans to pick us up and take us … Continue reading St. Luke Pilgrimage to Italy, Day 1 \u2014 November 10th, 2025<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pilgrimage-2025"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5260"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5337,"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5260\/revisions\/5337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pisarro.org\/aboutnick\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}