0757 In hotel reception. Woke up about 5am, irrationally bit panicked, only had bit of water so decided to put a water purifying tablet in bottle of water in case wanted a big drink later when no time. Bottle wouldn't fit in sink so had to fill from shower.
Did get back to sleep despite distubing (because they had a "WTF?" quality) noises from (I infer) adjacent room's bathroom. Woke on alarm 0740 but stupidly deliberately stayed in bed til next and final alarm 0745. Hasty dressing and teeth cleaning and checking round later am down here in reception I believe with everything. Not feeling 100% but I never do in morning and can hopefully rest on flight.
0800 Receptionist just give me bit of paper with number plate and 'clave' (read about this in guide book, tho this is 3 digits not 2) for taxi. Said I can wait here in reception and it will be here in about 5 minutes. I do wonder if she only just called to book it when I got down here, maybe not - don't recall hearing her call but then I was bashing out the above and not paying attention.
Said it would be 20kish or tiny bit more. We'll see I guess. It will be on meter.
0822 At airport. Driver didn't ask for clave and the (non-currency-denominated) meter seemed suspiciously large (300 odd) by midway and was worried was going to get stiffed or end up in a row but he said 23k so no problem. I didn't tip, haven't generally here.
0836 McDonalds, land side. Flight is about 20 mins late. Eating land side as I had water in my bag which would be a Security Threat (TM) (R) airside and so this opened up possibility of saving price of a drink with food. As it happens come to McDonald's and a (not overly filling but still OK) breakfast with orange juice only 12.5k. I do wish they did the regular menu instead of/as well as a breakfast one, but kudos to them for providing tolerably priced food at airports.
0922 At gate. Security OK though they asked me to open the bag of chap in front of me (I didn't, of course, we both explained), then they passed my bag through scanner a second time and I wasn't absolutely sure I was allowed to take it. I guess it's natural to fear a process as arbitrary and potentially freedom-threatening as airport security even when you aren't a terrorist or drug smuggler.
Not sure I have seen anywhere to eat airside but I am not really hungry, there will probably be some food on plane and don't see any point throwing money away on more food now so not questing for a restaurant. I have an 'emergency' packet of peanuts if I get desperate.
1047 Just got called up to counter via PA with a few other people. They just seemed to want to do some stuff with my passport including swiping the magnetic strip; I suspect this is because I checked in online, though even so it's a bit unusual. Still, no harm done. Departure time still showing 1140 as it has since got to airport.
Oh, I was at Hotel San Sebastian here in Bogota (room 501, trivia fans!).
1134 On flight. Woman assigned seat next to me appears to require five minutes discussion with her friends to confirm it is her seat. Still, she's not fat and I have my aisle seat so who cares?
1204 Yay, we have to return to the gate for an additional check.
Before this I was thinking I should have checked prices for eg Bogota-London. Probably not cheaper given sunk cost of London-BA return (which I could only have avoided with much more rigid planning, since insurance shit prohibited leaving UK without a flight home booked) but by the time you factor in a not-very-valuable-as-holiday two nights accommodation in BA and two extra city centre-airport journeys in BA it just might have worked out cheaper. Meh. Too late now of course. Delay obviously super welcome, since this way there's a good chance I won't get to the hotel til 11pmish and that means, it being Sunday, I won't be tempted to indulge in the vice of eating dinner as everywhere will definitely be shut, instead of just probably.
1235 I think we are now at the gate for this check. FFS.
1240 Yay, there's some minor fault which has to be fixed.
1411 We might be taking off shortly. Fantastic!
1540 We weren't. We are in the air now and have been a while. I think we're going to land 3-4h late. This is a real fucker as it may rule out taking the minibus to that terminal round the back of Retiro (can't remember name) and a taxi from there. If so I could end up paying something like 40-50 fucking dollars for a taxi. I now wish I'd paid the 29 dollar pickup fee the hotel was offering, but of course I couldn't know we were going to be massively delayed and 29 is insane too. The fucking hotel room costs 25 dollars a night, less than a fucking taxi, possibly half as much! Fucking taxis, fucking airports built a billion miles out of town with no fucking decent public transport.
(Since I pretty much have to get a taxi to airport to fly home - time too tight to risk the public bus - and (although it's not particularly dangerous in BA) I never like to get a cab off the street to go long distance I will have to ask the hotel for a cab to airport and that pretty much puts me in the position of them sticking me for USD29. I was 'expecting' this outbound but inbound I expected to be able to trade time and convenience for money, but thanks to this delayed flight I'm probably fucked. Bunch of cunts. They should fucking be obligated to compensate me; we're not looking at a 15 minute delays here.)
It is fractionally tempting to camp out at the airport and get the first public bus into town, but the risk of then oversleeping tomorrow night is too high, even were it not otherwise an unpleasant prospect.
1552 My (outdated) guide book suggests the minibus runs up to midnight. Just have to wait and see I guess. They said lunch would be served once we reached cruising altitude but no sign of it yet. I expect it to be inedible just because I'm keener than usual - if not desperate, breakfast was 725kcal (it happened to be printed on the display board), I probably have 500-1000kcal of peanuts and a packet of extra strong mints so I'm not going to starve, and as I recall there are lots of 24h shops near hotel so may be able to get some crisps or something on arrival at hotel - but you never know and at least a drink would be nice.
1649 Food actually OK. Not enormous quantity of course but OK.
1920 Finally finished Atlas Shrugged, which I have been reading on and off possibly since I started this holiday back in October. I can't help but feel it's about twice as long as it ought to be.
2312 (Argentina) Yay. I'm at the Manuel Tienda Leon stand out where the bus arrives (couldn't fucking understand instructions after buying ticket inside terminal and like a fuckwit I just said OK and walked off through the one-way door, but someone pointed me over here without even asking exactly what I was lucking for. Next bus is midnight. Thanks once again, Aerolineas Argentinas, for that three hour delay. They go half hourly earlier I believe. Still, it "only" cost ARS110 vs ARS380 I was quoted for a remise direct to hotel, so as long as I can get a taxi I should save money. I put "only" in quotes because at the official exchange rate that's still nearly fourteen quid. For a bus. Fucking hell, it doesn't cost that much to get a fucking train from Gatwick (IIRC) or the tube from Heathrow. Still, I'm going to be getting to the hotel about 1am if I'm lucky, more like 1:30am if I had to make a bet on it. I hope they haven't decided to give my room away or anything, I understand a booking isn't generally considered binding in the hotel trade. If I want to go out for a bottle of water or some food - and frankly I might not, I can purify some tap water and maybe skip cleaning my teeth rather than wait the hour (or is it 30 mins?) it takes to purify. On the other hand, my body clock is two hours earlier than local time and I'm a night person, so if I don't get to bed til 2am local time that's only midnight body clock. I am feeling a bit tired though. We'll see I guess. I might be fighting to find a taxi at 2am for all I know.
Guy at booth here told me very explicitly 'here at midnight, or 10-15 mins before'. Cos I guess I might decide to pop back into terminal for a quick meal or something. As if, when I can enjoy standing around aimlessly? At least the weather is OK; they said 15C as we came in to land and with jacket on it feels very pleasant.
2324 Trying to look on the bright side - and while decidedly not chuffed I'm not at the "swearing out loud in English" point - I had ARS300 left from January and I have to assume it will turn into bum fodder by the next time I'm here given the state of the Argentinian economy. I still need to "live" for the next day and a bit but the hotel is going to be paid in USD and the taxi to the airport might be so in some very narrow sense this is "free" (or rather, allows me to claw back some of my excessive withdrawal back in January - not that I can blame myself, what with insane per-withdrawal fees - iirc four quid a pop, I am sure I bitched about it on blog at time tho - in this broken economy it wasn't easy to be too precise, it never is - anyway, perhaps I should say the marginal cost of this bus/taxi is close to zero instead). I also have sufficient USD that if necessary - and they'll deal with the tiny amounts, which is less clear - I can go to a street money changer for the unofficial rate instead of having to withdraw any cash. This is not an accident, I was v careful to ensure adequate USD supplies when I left Ecuador.
2335 The ticket does actually say 'Lavalle y Maipu' which is where I told the chap my hotel was; guide book does say bus will drop you at some central hotels, so I just possibly - not to get my hopes up - might actually get dropped right there.
2347 On bus.
2349 We're off.
2351 Asked ticket checking chap if could get down at corner Lavalle (no idea if that's a Spanishy ll or not) and Maipu and he said yes. So fingers crossed.
2354 We've stopped somewhere on the airport complex. Isn't this exciting? Best blog evar.
(I deliberately have my bag with me instead of in the boot to faciliate getting off.)
2355 "Englishman in New York" playing very softly on crackly radio.
0013 "Got a feeling I could be someone... remember when you're driving in your car"
0038 At Terminal Madero. I asked, this is 'Lavalle y Maipu'. So why the fuck do they
0044 OK, it looks like the ticket includes (?) an onward connection in a shared cab. Milling around terminal on sheep grounds has revealed this. I might get a cab over here and bus out to airport on Monday morning. Guide book undersold the service if is included connection.
0112 Yes, so bus+cab not too bad value. Checked in. VAT of 21% on top - I just *luuurve* the way booking.com doesn't include this in the headline price and then sometimes you do get charged it and sometimes you don't - so USD62 for two nights but still could be worse, can't remember if charged VAT last time. In room 2, different from last time but OK. Went out for food. 24h restaurant opposite but rather pricey (if understandable). 'Abierto 25 horas' on corner but drunk fuckwit occupying the tiny pigeonhole through the grille with his two slimy sauce-covered hot dogs and not moving away after being served but instead chatting with guy on duty so fucked off to opposite corner. Another A25H there with lights on and guy inside but no hole in grille. WTF? Fortunately had spoted an open shop with no grille (not a chain) when had to walk a block after dropped off by taxi as road closed (not their fault) so went there. ARS44 or £5.50 for bottle of water, largish packet of biscuits and tiny packet of ham flavour crackers but a) this is in part the shitty official exchange rate b) it is 1am so I expect to pay a premium c) I paid less than expected to get here d) will probably go back to airport Tue via cab+MTL bus from terminal Madero so saving there e) therefore not that pissed off and it is also way cheaper than eating at that 24h restaurant f) but a bit pricey all the same g) I should eat - not that hungry but decided best get something - and clean my teeth and go to fucking bed and stop writing this. ;-) Will send now.
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