“Final destination, Bogota?”

Cedar Rapids - Atlanta - Bogota, Columbia - Lima, Peru

My alarm went off at 3:25am this morning, so I started a long travel day with about four hours of sleep.  Not ideal, but it’s enough to get by.  After Jennifer dropped me off at the airport, I ran into the day’s first obstacle when I tried to check in. Apparently, the flight I booked from Bogota to Lima doesn’t fly today!  Why did they sell me a ticket for a non-existent flight?  No one knows, but they hurriedly booked me on a similar flight so it all worked out.  It’s really great to fly out of Cedar Rapids because it’s so small and easy to navigate!  The gate agent told me I would need to check in again in Bogota for the Lima flight.  Will by checked bag go through to Lima, or do I need to pick it up in Bogota and go through Customs with it?  🤷🏼‍♀️ was her exact response. Cool, cool.  I guess I’ll just figure that out.  

There’s nothing interesting to report between Cedar Rapids and Atlanta or Atlanta to Bogota.  But in Bogota things got exciting again.  After I de-plane, I go to the area for International Connections and tell the woman working there that I’m going to Lima. She looks at me like I’m dumb and directs me back out to go through Immigration.  I think I was in the right place, but I can’t prove it.  In any case, I go through Immigration to Baggage Claim to see if my bag is here.  Nope!  So, I go ask a couple of women working in the baggage area, and they’re like “I think you went the wrong way.  You should maybe try to go back through Immigration” (there are many signs saying you should not do this).  Now, getting arrested in a foreign country would give me fresh new material for class, but I quickly decide I’m not that dedicated.  Since I don’t want to get arrested at the Bogota airport, I just decided to go out and check in again which is really my only legal option at this point.  After finally getting my boarding pass and making my way back through security, I made my way to the terminal and decided it was time for a beer.  For the record, “Club Columbia” cerveza is not my favorite, but options were limited.  

After a beer I had an hour to kill, so I went for a walk through the terminal to get some steps in before boarding my final flight of the day to Lima.  On my walk, I saw a woman, probably in her 60s, start screaming at the gate agents.  What was she upset about? Don’t know, but she was literally screaming and crying. As I’m walking by, I see two women who work at the airport assisting people in wheelchairs turn around toward the gate and then start running over there.  The woman who was so upset has collapsed and she’s lying on the floor at the gate not moving. Then she starts yelling again as they help her up, and she’s obviously distressed about something.  The two women who ran over to help walk away kind of rolling their eyes, so I’m guessing it wasn’t that serious.  

Flight to Lima was uneventful.  My bag was there (yay!), I exchanged some money, and walked across the street to my hotel.  Literally across the street from the airport, thirty seconds from the International Arrivals area.  I check in, have my complimentary pisco sour, and now it’s time for a shower and bed.  No photos today, but I’ll do better on that tomorrow.

In the morning I will walk back across the street, catch my 50 minute flight to Cusco, and then hopefully find my pre-booked taxi to take me to my home base for the next week:  Ollantaytambo.

Takeaways from today:  Being even a little conversational in Spanish would be incredibly helpful. Como esta, muy bien, si/no, and gracias don’t go very far.

Daily step count:  A relatively weak 9,921 (it’s hard to walk when you’re on three flights in one day).