Day 1-4: Trying to get to Uruguay!
Packing for this trip was an adventure in itself. How do you pack a large family for a 3 1/2 month trip to South America? Add to that Christopher's food allergies and the requests of friends and acquaintances in UY for items not easily found down here, and packing became a bit challenging. My attempts to do so in an organized fashioned were thwarted by the problem of baggage weight limits. As the clock ticked away, I was madly rearranging our luggage to keep each bag under the limit. I finally had to grab some additional duffel bags and stuff items into them and into the children's bags. We finally managed to finish packing, get loaded into our van, and onto the road to LAX by around 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday Sept. 4th.
Our plane was scheduled to leave LAX at 2:00 a.m. We picked up a friend (thank you, Julie!) near the airport who drove us the rest of the way, dropping us off at Copa Airlines with our 14 bags!! of check-in luggage and our carry-ons. We were finally on our way - or so we thought.... Security posed our first small challenge. Somehow one of the children (not the one you might suspect) managed to pack an old Swiss Army knife in their bag. The offending item was finally located in their carry-on suitcase, removed, and we were sent on our way. We still arrived at our gate with ample time to spare and were looking forward to being able to sleep on the plane.
Alas, this was not to be our fate. Around 1:15 a.m., our flight was canceled due to mechanical problems and rescheduled for 11:oo a.m. the next morning. Copa airlines shuttled all the passengers to a Holiday Inn near the airport where I had to wait in line for at least 45 minutes before getting 2 rooms for us. By the time we got to sleep it was almost 3:00 a.m.! We were all exhausted! In the morning we caught a shuttle back to the airport at 9:20.
Waiting for the shuttle to take us to the hotel and waiting in the lobby for our room.
Now some real waiting began. We had get new boarding passes, which required a several hour wait in line at the Copa Airlines desk. Since we had missed our connecting flight to UY, we were rerouted through Buenos Aires which would have put our arrival time only about 5 hours behind schedule. However, by the time the plane finally took off from LAX, everyone on our flight had missed their connecting flights in Panama, so when we arrived at the airport we were shuttled in yet another bus to a rather run down hotel in a seedy part of Panama City. More lines, more waiting - the kids finally fell asleep around 11:00 p.m. after eating a sparse dinner provided by the hotel for the hungry airline travelers.
After being stuck in airports, Chris & Elli were thrilled to stick their heads out the bus window in Panama.
All of the other passengers had to catch a 7:00 shuttle, but because our flight didn't leave until 5:50 p.m., they arranged to have our family picked up at 1:oo. We were happy to have some time to relax a bit, so in the morning we slept in, ate breakfast (courtesy of Copa) and went swimming in the pool on the roof. It was a lovely interlude before the next grueling leg of our journey.
What a pleasant surprise to find a pool & grass at the top of this older hotel in downtown Panama City.
We got ourselves ready to go before 1:00 and waited, and waited, and waited. No taxis or shuttle appeared. The front desk tried to contact the airlines multiple times but the lines were always busy. I had no phone, no internet service, and the phone card Copa gave me didn't work, so I couldn't get a hold of Andrew or the people in UY who were supposed be picking us up. In addition, the airline failed to inform the hotel that we needed food other than our breakfast. We'd been strongly warned not to leave the hotel due the location, and other than the breakfast bar which closed at 10:00, the hotel had no food available. By 4:15 we were starting to get really concerned. Finally, at around 4:30 we got in contact with the airlines who had forgotten us. They told us to take two taxis to the airport and they would pay the drivers. By the time everything was worked out, and we had our new boarding passes it was almost time to board the plane. No time for a good meal, but we were grateful to finally be on a plane for Montevideo.
This flight left without delay and we arrived on time (a day late) at 4:00 a.m. in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay. It was now Friday, September 7th. I wasn't too concerned about clearing customs, but when I went to get my bags, I discovered that one of our bags had been randomly chosen for inspection. Unfortunately, this was the bag with lots of nuts in it. Nuts are very expensive in UY, and a friend of mine in Montevideo had requested that I bring her a good supply. Since my Spanish is poor, the inspector had to call over some one who spoke English. I explained that these were not for resale but for myself and a friend. "Sorry, absolutely no!" was her response. She walked away, leaving me a bit in shock. I turned back toward the inspector who discreetly closed up my bag, smiled, and waved me on - with all of my nuts still in the bag! Again I was shocked, but very grateful and relieved. With tired children and numerous bags in tow, were we waved past the rest of the regular customs gauntlet and into the airport. My friend (who I brought the nuts for) had arranged for some people she knew to pick us up in two cars and a van at the airport and bring us to her home. What a blessing!! It was so nice to arrive exausted in a foreign country and not have to worry about transportation. When we got to her home we were extremely grateful to find comfortable beds waiting for all of us. We all fell promptly asleep and slept until around noon. We had finally made it!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment