Flying to Quito

January 7, 2023 and today I am on my way from Liphook to Quito to meet Lisa, her husband Rob and Ann Genovese for 10 days in Mindo and Napo.

I look forward to knowing Lisa and Rob better and getting to know Ann. I want to see some beautiful birds, butterflies and orchids, maybe even see an olinguito. I don't want to see a jumping death spider - or any type of spider. (Or snake)

Up at 5 and Nick's guy came for me this morning at 6am for the trip to the airport. The train strike is costing me $250 in round trip taxi fare to LHR. This guy was weird- parked by the wrong house, dropped me off in the garage instead of departures and charged me £118 when I was expecting £105, so no tip because I assumed it included the tip. Seems there were some added things that somehow Nick doesn't charge when he drives us. Anyway- not the end of the world.

I was packing light again on this trip - my 35L pack and my mom's old carry-on

BA lounge was empty and had my traditional glass of champagne to start the journey off right.

Chris was saying flight 207 had a terrible "on-time" record of being hours late. This flight was a full full full A380 which boarded and left pretty much on time. Flew business class and was a 9+ hour flight.

Here are the menus- had the sweet potato and fish with cheese for dessert. Didn't really like the wines so stuck to water. I did have a Bailey and coffee:). Saw about 3 movies- a thousand years of loneliness, Thor love and a story about the first female general in the Pakistani Army - this was surprisingly good.

Finally got my "known traveler number" on my boarding pass and had the embarrassment of security finding a pocket knife I forgot was in my pack. Got some $$ and made my way down to the AA lounge where I had a shower and champagne and some steak.

The AA 2259 was delayed on take off due to a mechanical issue and was sure it would be cancelled. We left about an hour late and amazingly made up most of the time. It is a full full full flight. I was exhausted. The flight seemed to take forever to board and felt like people boarded for about 35 minutes onto the 737max- I think the a380 boarded faster than this.

It was nice to get water with a cup full of ice! Dinner was awful- one of worst ones since started flying. Chicken. I think the stewardess dropped a key part of dinner when there was a loud crash before serving.

Formalities at the Ecuador end were surprisingly easy. The airport was modern with an easy passport control where I got my first stamp in my new passport. The people were really nice and my taxi was waiting.

At the EB Hotel I was upgraded to a suite. I was ready for bed as had been up for almost exactly 24 hours. Hadn't slept on either flight (no flatbeds on the 737Max).

Quito is 2850 meters above sea level and I felt it a bit going through the airport. Luckily felt fine the next morning.

Lisa and team were delayed about 3 hours due to weather and a number of other issues, finally landing about 1 am- poor guys! They were shattered in the morning.