Evening departure to Rome

Day 1 - Monday, June 11 - Evening departure to Rome. 

We depart via connecting overnight flights from Washington Dulles Airport to Rome, Italy. 

We're off!  The bus trip was uneventful; however things got more exciting as the day moved on. We boarded our plane only to find out that we would have an hour delay before take-off due to bad weather east of Washington D.C. Our Air France flight attendants were very accommodating during our delay. Due to the fact that our flight was an hour late, our connection in Paris was going to be a fast transition. When we arrived, we found that there was construction at the airport and it was a little confusing finding where are departing gate was located. First we had to show our passports and then move on to our terminal. As soon as we reached the escalator to take us to our flight we were stopped by airport security. They had closed down our terminal because of unattended luggage. It was frustrating, but also comforting that they were operating such a secure airport. We were soon greeted by a what appeared to be a military policeman carrying an AK-47. He was very friendly and even took time to pose for pictures. After a short wait, we were allowed to proceed to our terminal, but we still had to go through security again and it was flight time! Miraculously, after having our group separated in to several security stations, we boarded our flight (better late than never) and flew off to Rome.