FLY OUT DAY- Friday 13th July 2018

A bit excited for our plane to depart, Kat and I sat back at the gate.. the plane was delayed and after waiting a while, we went back with the boys to get some more food and have a few more drinks. We got a little carried away and could hear our flights last call for us to board. We were only a quick 5 minute jog away from our gate so we ran through the airport giggling (a little tipsy from our pre-plane drinks). Finally on the plane, nice and comfy ready to go we were sested next to a lovely older American lady who ended up becoming Shanes drinking partner. While they drank, I had a nap and was woken up to news that we had an emergency medical situation and needed to stop at Christchurch New Zealand. We were too heavy to land and had to dump \24045,000L of fuel to land safely. The plane was getting hot and we were heating up, Steve and I weren’t feeling very well. There were just so many people on the plane and no air-con. They also cut the bar so I had a frustrated, sobering up Shane and Denise (our American friend) on my hands. After about 2 or 3 hours we were finally ready for take off (again). Shane and I had a sleeping pill each and both slept until an hour and a half before landing. What a beautiful country to fly into, absolutely breath taking. Snowy mountain tops, wide landscapes of untouched land. We finally arrive at Santiago, to a massive line of people waiting to have their connecting flights organised. A bunch of people were being called to collect accommodation details and flight information for the next day. We lined up and lucky Shane went to a quick line on the side and asked the lady behind the desk what was planned for us. She printed boarding tickets for us but we still needed to line up to organise our baggage transfers. We got to the front of the line (after waiting over an hour or two) to find out that the baggage had already been organised. We used the opportunity to ensure our transfer will be ready for us at the Buenos Aires airport and to make sure our hotel will let us check in at the expected time of 2am. After all of that, we needed a proper feed (airplane food just didn’t cut it). We had Fritz, a burger and beer place at the airport. Yummmm everything was so fresh, the buns were warm and lightly toasted and the patty was nice and thick, with three slices of melted cheese mmm! We put ourselves in a bit of a food coma so had to have a lie down at the airport, we caught a bit of sleep and had some snacks. An hour before our flight is meant to depart we head to the other side of the airport to our gate. Waiting at the gate, we notice everyone is still laying down. There are notices over the PA but only in Spanish. It gets closer and closer to departure and we realise there must have been ANOTHER delay. We did the best we could to communicate with a young girl across from us who spoke little English and she said, yes, change in flight. Firstly only by half an hour and then.. delayed again by another hour.

Saturday 14th July

Due to depart, finally we board the plane and are seated next to a lovely lady. She was seated at the window seat and asked to sit in the isle because she had a bad knee. YAY I wasn’t complaining! Shane let me sit on the isle seat again. The lady was so concerned about the delay and stressed that it never happens, I guess that was our luck that day and hopefully going forward it’s smooth sailing.

30 hours door to door 😴