Day 1: Chicago to Lima

Today is our travel day! We woke up at 5am to get ready and add any final touches to packing. Since we were leaving so early, we opted to take a Lyft (thanks Chase Sapphire benefits!) rather than the bus to the L. Also, there is construction on the Addison bridge where the blue line stop is, so we just bypassed the whole thing. Unfortunately, that means we had no train to point at to start the trip.

Maaaaybe it’s a Peru flag

We arrived at the airport right on time and proceeded to check our bags. It was fairly crowded for 6:15 am and the American Airline agents were doing their best to shuffle people from the bag check kiosks to the various counters and then to the correct security line. Now that we are pros at printing and attaching bag tags, we breezed through the process and proceeded to the TSA Pre-check line… which was quite long. When everyone has TSA Pre-check, no one does. Luckily, an agent directed us to the next line over, where there were only a few people.

Our gate was pretty close to security, so we found seats and made our breakfast and caffeine plan. We were right next to the food court which had huge lines and long waits for both McDonald’s and Starbucks, which also both conveniently have order-ahead options on the app. We’re not sure why airports make us crave Egg McMuffins, but here we are. Breakfast plan was activated and we were soon awake and full. We also happened to be seated across from Vogues Chocolate – shout out to Jenny’s early 20s.

The flight was a bit late to board because the plane was late coming from… the hangar. What, was there traffic? We weren’t worried because we booked this early flight to ensure enough layover time in Miami. We had the 30 minutes to spare, so all was good. Once we did board, our row was full, but the row right next to us had an open aisle seat. Our window seat companion decided to jump ship to the aisle, leaving us with a bit extra room. Thanks, sir! The flight went well and we were in Miami soon enough.

Fresh from the hangar

Open middle seat karma

Upon landing, we discovered that our next gate for the flight to Lima was across from the gate we landed in. So much for needed extra time in Miami to navigate the giant airport. On the bright side, we landed in the international terminal where there is a priority pass lounge. Since we had the time, we figured we’d press our luck and see if they’d be so kind as to let us in. We started making our way over, when people on those golf cart things asked if we were heading to the lounge and gave us a ride. It really wasn’t that far as to need the cart ride, but it was handy. And we got to act like we were on the amazing race when we passed the other cart of lounge goers.

Arriving at D42, next flight D43

This map does not clarify that MIA is Super Mario 3 Giant World-sized

To make things even better, the lounge actually let us in. Thanks, Turkish Airlines Lounge! We had time to eat some lunch (mmm, Turkish food), catch up on emails, and relax. Eventually it was time to get back to the gate to board. The cart drivers were nowhere to be seen so we hoofed it a whole 10 minutes back to the gate.

When the Priority Pass lounge still works (shockingly)

The flight was the usual – crochet, movies, snacks. The plane did seem to be full of large groups of families, EF education tours, and youth groups/mission trips. It was basically a party plane with people playing card games and chatting.

Must have run out of Incan deserts on the flight to Peru

The amount of groups was helpful when we landed and they all waited for each other to go through customs — making the line pretty non-existent. We flew through customs, and our bags arrived pretty quickly, allowing us to catch the shuttle to the hotel. Fun fact, Lima opened this new airport about a week ago, using the same runway as the old airport. It still has that new airport smell.

New Lims Airport customs a breeze

The airport is all new and shiny, but they didn’t create the infrastructure and roads to really support it, causing a 25 minutes shuttle ride to the hotel that is just across from the old airport. A new hotel will open right across from the new airport, but not until the end of the month. Alas, the shuttle it is!

Shuttle to the old Wyndham (new one doesn’t open til July)

Because the hotel is attached to the old airport (which is essentially closed except for office use), the shuttle had to go through some gates and checkpoints to enter. This is probably the most secure hotel we’ve stayed at because no one is allowed in the old airport building.