I’m traveling again. For fun. For me. Don’t get me wrong, I am very dedicated to my job. I work hard. My work is of a good quality. But my passion is travel. Seeing other countries. Learning about other cultures. Seeing the natural beauty of somewhere far from home. This trip brings me to Chile for two weeks. It has been 10 years since my last trip to Chile – disappointing as Chile is definitely in my top 5 countries. AND, I have two close Chilean friends here. But, sadly, I have only so much vacation to see the places I’ve never seen and to return to the places I love.
This trip started with a business class flight from Atlanta to Miami on Delta, followed by a business class flight on LATAM (Latin America’s biggest airline – headquartered in Chile with major operations in Chile, Brazil and Peru) from Miami to Santiago. Round-trip cost? Only $2400US. (You see, if you can be flexible with dates and set up fare trackers you can often find reasonable pricing for business class tickets.)
I’ll spare you the details of Atlanta-Miami as it was your typical boring domestic flight. Nothing particularly good or bad. In Miami Delta dumps you out into Terminal H, which is directly connected to Terminal J (the international terminal for non-One World airlines). These terminals may now well be the worst it America given the improvements at JFK and LaGuardia. Dimly lit, with narrow hallways they look like they were last updated sometime in the 70’s. Worse, there is not one decent sit down restaurant for all those waiting for overnight flights to South America or Europe. In fact, there is not one sit down restaurant at all. Your choice is generally a food court with a McDonald’s offering a $15 BigMac “Value Meal” or other generic fast food. I skipped it all and headed to the LATAM lounge (I had access because of my business class ticket) in hopes of enjoying dinner so I could just go straight to sleep on my flight.
The LATAM lounge was a disappointment – and in hindsight I should have left and gone to the SkyClub. While generally well-furnished and bright with floor to ceiling windows, the food was very disappointing and looked so poor that I did not even bother trying it – and certainly could not have made an adequate dinner from it. The self-serve bar was very limited in its offerings – for red wine (my favorite) there was a choice between a very cheap US Red and a decent Chilean Carmenere (my choice). With a 4 hour layover I had hoped to use my computer but there were almost no outlets in the lounge and the work cubicles were in a dark corner and also did not have outlets. All that said, the club never felt crowded and certainly was a better place to stay than in the terminal.
Boarding began 50 minutes before the flight and I was one of the first on board. LATAM’s business product is outdated, featuring lie-flat seats but in a 2-2-2 seating so great for couples but no privacy for a solo traveler. For me, when confronted with this layout I always choose the middle section as I can access the aisle with out climbing over anyone nor will anyone climb over me to reach the aisle. The seats are very comfortable both as a seat and as a bed. No predeparture beverages were offered – odd given we had almost an hour before pushback and indeed it was nearly 1.5 hours before we actually took off, but, a water bottle was at each seat. Dinner was served shortly after we reached altitude and included choices of a smoked salmon salad, a non-descript beef in some sort of gravy and a cheese lasagna. I chose the lasagna ate it and quickly went to sleep.
I slept for a full 6 hours before being woken by a flight attendant for breakfast. I enjoyed an omelet with a yogurt and fresh fruit and soon we were on final approach to Chile with the snow-capped Andes visible outside the windows.
NEXT: First day in Chile
The Kahn Man 