Arrival filled with disasters

purduecal — Sat, 5 Jul 2008 12:59:00 GMT

The entire flight of 3-1/2 hours from OAK to DFW then 9-1/2 hours to SCL wasn't too bad. The plane out of Oakland was a bit cramped but to my surprise, AA has brought real stainless knives back on the planes. It was much easier eating with real silverware in the air again.

The second leg of the trip from DFW to SCL was much better since it had the full lie-flat seats. Surprisingly they weren't comfortable enough for me to fall asleep in that I kept tossing and turning for about 2 hours until I finally went to sleep only to be awakened 2 hours later for breakfast.

I get to the airport and ask one of the employees if I needed to pay the U.S. reciprocity fee of $131 since I had a Philippine passport too. She said it wasn't a problem and to just present my Philippine passport to immigration. As expected, I couldn't use my Philippine passport without a visa so I got sent back to the reciprocity line. When I went back to the other line, I realized I was in the wrong line, the transit line so I had to go again to another line.

By the time I got to the baggage claim area, my snowboard bag was gone. AA claims this is common to snowboard bags so to not worry. In the meantime, I already filed a claim against my insurance company for a lost bag. I have a feeling they won't find my bag.

After 1-1/2 hours of waiting in wrong lines and for the last bag to come out of AA flight 945, I walk outside to find a worried hotel driver. He thought I had missed him on my way out. Just like everyone here in Chile, he thought my first name was Sebastian.

I get to the hotel and find that they don't have my room ready yet. In a way that was good because I needed to shop for replacement snowboarding clothes. I noticed a huge mall right beside the hotel so I headed there. This mall was huge. I found myself walking around for 3 hours watching the different stores open up. There were all kinds of ski clothes on liquidacion so I grabbed a jacket and pants for about US$30 each; a deal.

By the time I got back to the hotel, it was a bit past noon and my room was ready. My bellboy knocks on the door seconds after I walked in and guess what his name was, Sebastian. It's weird to see Sebastian all over, including one of the wig stores in the mall.

I tried to check out the Bellavista area which is the happening place but realized that everyone does everything late here. I was there around 8 PM and everyone was just getting set up. I figured it would be too late for me to do Bellavista since my bus was picking me up at 8:30 AM. I opted to have dinner at the hotel and call it a day. I've been walking around so much that I need a massage. I'll schedule one when I arrive in Portillo.

Summer Chill in Chile

Arrival filled with disasters