Friday, October 10, 2008
Clare & Bri (& Heather)’s Excellent Adventure: Peru
Friday, 9.19: Miami to Lima
Our adventure began with a rendezvous in Miami. I had discovered that, for some reason, if we booked our tickets piecemeal through LAN (that is, booked flights from our respective locations to Miami, then a separate flight from Miami to Lima), the price was hundreds of dollars cheaper than if we booked straight to Lima, even though the connections were exactly the same. (This is just one of the frustrating and inexplicable price discrepancies we would discover on LAN throughout the course of planning our trip.) Anyway, our red-eye flight wasn’t scheduled to leave Miami until 1:35 in the morning, which meant I could get a direct evening flight from D.C. in plenty of time to make the connection—which also meant I got to work for most of the day. Bri and Heather, meanwhile, were coming from cities without the same flight frequency to Miami, so, not wanting to take any risks, they flew in fairly early in the morning and spent the day on South Beach while I was cooped up in the office. Despite never having met before, they bonded instantly over the shared experience of being swindled into an expensive lunch by the promise of cheap cocktails, and by the time I arrived around 8, they had become fast friends (and also, in Bri’s case, slightly sunburned).
After meeting up at baggage claim, we headed to the LAN desk to check in, then went off in search of dinner. Most of the restaurants were already closed by the extremely late hour of 9 (WTF, Miami?), so we were forced to eat at Sbarro. (The bizarre early closing time also meant we weren’t able to partake in our pre-flight ritual of a Starbucks Frappuccino in honor of our symbolic traveling companion, Britney Spears.) After a somewhat gross meal, we headed to our gate, where we stretched out and tried to get some sleep before the flight. This proved to be impossible, as a) the airport was freaking freezing, b) the otherwise quiet terminal was dominated by the strains of extremely loud Muzak, and c) we’d chosen to camp out right by a television, which was broadcasting some political talk show on CNN, on which people were yammering on and on about Sarah Palin. Sadly, although we were about to board a plane and leave the U.S. behind, this was far from the last time we would hear Sarah Palin’s name uttered on our trip.
Once we got on the plane, it was much easier to sleep. We all dozed for pretty much the entire flight, although I did wake up for the 2 a.m. dinner service. Yep, that’s right—although it would have made much more sense for the one meal on our 5-hour flight to have been breakfast, they decided to serve dinner instead. Having already been woken up by the clanging of the cart and slightly hungry after my lackluster pizza slice from Sbarro, I decided to partake of the “canalones” before going back to sleep.
Continue to Day 2: Lima to the Amazon River Basin
Friday, 9.19: Miami to Lima
Our adventure began with a rendezvous in Miami. I had discovered that, for some reason, if we booked our tickets piecemeal through LAN (that is, booked flights from our respective locations to Miami, then a separate flight from Miami to Lima), the price was hundreds of dollars cheaper than if we booked straight to Lima, even though the connections were exactly the same. (This is just one of the frustrating and inexplicable price discrepancies we would discover on LAN throughout the course of planning our trip.) Anyway, our red-eye flight wasn’t scheduled to leave Miami until 1:35 in the morning, which meant I could get a direct evening flight from D.C. in plenty of time to make the connection—which also meant I got to work for most of the day. Bri and Heather, meanwhile, were coming from cities without the same flight frequency to Miami, so, not wanting to take any risks, they flew in fairly early in the morning and spent the day on South Beach while I was cooped up in the office. Despite never having met before, they bonded instantly over the shared experience of being swindled into an expensive lunch by the promise of cheap cocktails, and by the time I arrived around 8, they had become fast friends (and also, in Bri’s case, slightly sunburned).
After meeting up at baggage claim, we headed to the LAN desk to check in, then went off in search of dinner. Most of the restaurants were already closed by the extremely late hour of 9 (WTF, Miami?), so we were forced to eat at Sbarro. (The bizarre early closing time also meant we weren’t able to partake in our pre-flight ritual of a Starbucks Frappuccino in honor of our symbolic traveling companion, Britney Spears.) After a somewhat gross meal, we headed to our gate, where we stretched out and tried to get some sleep before the flight. This proved to be impossible, as a) the airport was freaking freezing, b) the otherwise quiet terminal was dominated by the strains of extremely loud Muzak, and c) we’d chosen to camp out right by a television, which was broadcasting some political talk show on CNN, on which people were yammering on and on about Sarah Palin. Sadly, although we were about to board a plane and leave the U.S. behind, this was far from the last time we would hear Sarah Palin’s name uttered on our trip.
Once we got on the plane, it was much easier to sleep. We all dozed for pretty much the entire flight, although I did wake up for the 2 a.m. dinner service. Yep, that’s right—although it would have made much more sense for the one meal on our 5-hour flight to have been breakfast, they decided to serve dinner instead. Having already been woken up by the clanging of the cart and slightly hungry after my lackluster pizza slice from Sbarro, I decided to partake of the “canalones” before going back to sleep.
Continue to Day 2: Lima to the Amazon River Basin
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