What a day! A simple one at first glance flying from Santiago to La Paz.
So after an ok sleep in Santiago, i had my free breakfast and then hiked my bags down to Los Heros to catch the Centropuerto bus to the airport. That was a breeze as was the airport. There wasn’t much to eat at the airport, so i had a choice of coffee from Dunkin Donuts or Starbucks…….
The plane was about 30 minutes late departing and was stopping at Iquique on the north coast of Chile before heading to La Paz. We arrived at Iquique a few minutes late which was good news. I walked inside cleared immigration and walked back onto the plane. We took off and I must say the views of this part of the world are spectacular. Snow capped volcanoes rising out of the desert, then I saw lake Titicaca and then we were about to land…..
The pilot said something, the spanish speakers on the plane groaned. Apparently they closed La Paz airport to remove a plane from the runway. Why this plane was stationary on the runway, I’m not sure. So our plane not carrying enough fuel to circle for too long returned to Iquique. after an hour we took off again and landed in La Paz. I looked for the charred remains of an aircraft but none were to be seen, so maybe it was a minor issue why the plane wouldn’t move off the runway.
The sole American groaned at the $135 visa he had to buy, they pissed the Bolivian government off it seems. Everyone else was free. The border official passed my grasp of Spanish and said I spoke spanish well enough. Then he wanted to know if I was looking for a bolivian wife. “No senor, gracias.” was all i could muster as I made a hasty departure.
Luckily for me my driver was still waiting at the airport for me. The views of the Valley that La Paz lies in were spectacular, too bad the altitude and the crazy driving were distracting me. Then I got a room on the second floor. I can tell you I puffed a bit when I got to my room carrying my luggage. I feel ok when I’m not moving too much….
No pictures today, but this wifi is woefully slow, so i may not get much luck at all in Bolivia.
