The Night My Sister And I Lost The Last Room In Lucca

And I Lost My Eye Mask Too.

We arrived in Lucca on a perfect summer evening. We got off the train. We had a hotel to check into. We had a plan.

Then I saw the Chinese restaurant.

I was hungry. I am not pleasant when I am hungry. My sister Laurie will confirm this. I absolutely thought the hotel could wait. I had to eat.

So we ate. And that is how the entire disaster began.

By the time we got to the hotel there was only one room left. We weren't crazy about it. But the front desk mentioned there was another hotel up the street. We looked at each other. Maybe something better was out there. (Story of my life. With hotels and with men).

We picked up our bags and went to check it out.

The second hotel was full. We were still standing in the lobby when another couple walked in right behind us. The front desk told them the same thing — full, but there's a hotel up the street.

Oh my God. That's our street. That's our hotel. Let's go.

So as to not alert them that we were headed that way too We walked out the door calmly. Dignified. Until we hit the street. Then we literally bolted up that street

The other couple got into a car. We did not have a car. What we had were suitcases. Big ones. The kind with two wheels not four.There is no dignified way to do any of this.

We ran anyway. Through the medieval streets of Lucca. Dragging our suitcases sideways across 800-year-old cobblestones. Chasing a Fiat.

We lost.

They got the room. No other rooms anywhere in Lucca. We missed the last train out. Completely stranded.

However, Italy did what Italy always does best. Two kind young handsome Italian guys offered us their car for the night. My sister took the front seat. I took the back. A streetlight shone directly into my eyes all night long. I did have my eye mask positioned perfectly on my But, My sister reached over the seat in the dark and stole it right off my face.

I wanted to kill her. but she the had money. I didn't.

I couldn't afford an expert back then. Nobody told me about Ferragosto. Nobody warned me that in August, Italy essentially closes — hotels book out months in advance, trains fill up, and unsuspecting Americans end up sleeping in strangers' cars fighting over eye masks.

Honestly? I'm glad I couldn't afford it. Because that night in Lucca — broke, stranded, starving, eye-mask-less — is one of my worst and best memories. It is burned into me. It made me fall even harder for this country.

Its also one of the reasons I created Solo Per Noi.

You will never sleep in a car on my watch. But you will feel exactly what I felt that night — that Italy has claimed you completely and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

Looking back , It was one of the greatest nights of my life.

Ferragosto is theirs. The rest of the year is Solo Per Noi — Just For Us.