Taking the Plunge on Ryanair

After avoiding it for years, I will be flying Ryanair today from Frankfurt Hahn to Pisa, Italy. My brother is in town this week and we have never explored Tuscany or Rome so we’re off for an Italian adventure.

I won’t go into all the arduous gimmicks and fees I had to contend with to book the ticket now, but my expectations are very, very low for today’s flight. Tight legroom, militant carry-on limit enforcement, and aggressive buy-on-board sales epitomize Ryanair. Let’s see if that stereotype holds true.

My return ticket was EU14, but the total cost of the ticket when credit card fees and transportation to Hahn and back are factored in is closer to EU52—still a decent price for round-trip flight to Italy.

I thought about renting a car in Italy, but quickly gave up that idea when I recalled the tolls I had to deal with during my last drive through Northern Italy. We’ll use trains, which are actually are reasonably priced and faster than driving.

We had originally planned to stay in Rome for a few nights, but a very special opportunity has arisen in Milan, so we will be taking an overnight train from Rome to Milan early on Friday. That messes up my return trip out of Pisa because rail tickets from Milan to Pisa are quite high and the times are not convenient either. I am now trying to decide whether to cough up for a new flight from Milan to Frankfurt (on Lufty) or take the DB InterCity Express (ICE) train all the way back to save $60. I just am not in the mood to get up at the crack of dawn in order to catch a long train ride to Pisa, fly home on Ryanair, then take a two-hour bus ride from Hahn to central Frankfurt.

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