My first day in the Amazon is coming to an end. As with all trips, it wasn’t without it’s challenges, but for the most part this was a very interesting day. The plane ride was uneventful - cloudy weather made an early morning view of the jungle almost impossible and only a short glimpse of the Amazon was possible just before landing. After arriving in Iquitos a few minutes early, I was approached by a driver for a jungle lodge who asked where I was going. When I told him Hotel Acosta, he said that no one would be there because [View Full Entry]

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It’s almost midnight and I’ve made it to South America. I’m sitting in a Starbuck’s in the Lima airport killing time (only four hours left of my six-hour layover!) on the internet filling up with caffeine. The flight from Miami was nice. The food in first class was excellent - far too much for me to eat it all - and the trip through immigration, customs, and the LAN counter was uneventful. Even my luggage came off the carousel fairly quickly. The flight itself was uneventful, though I wish I had brought more to read. I unsuccessfully tried to sleep and [View Full Entry]

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I’m in the Miami airport following the first leg of my 24-hour journey to the Amazon. The shuttle picked me up a little before 6 am and dropped me off at the DFW terminal nearly three hours before my flight! Fortunately I was able to stop off at the American Airlines Admiral’s Club to kill time and catch up on a few things before catching the flight to Miami. Now I am in Florida awaiting my next flight to Lima in about 3½ hours. It seems like much of the construction here is finally finished. For a long time they were [View Full Entry]

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It's Monday night and the stress of getting ready to leave for South America is growing. My list of things to do is pretty lengthy, but at least I'm making progress. Still, I only have tomorrow to do a ton of stuff -- some of it is pretty important. My itinerary is pretty well locked in now. About a 7-10 days in Iquitos (including four down river in the jungle) and 5-7 days in Cusco with a couple of days visiting Machu Picchu tucked in there followed by a day or two in Lima before flying back to the US. The [View Full Entry]

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About 5 days to go until I head off to South America. My travel plans are starting to come together -- at least for the first half of the trip. I'll leave Wednesday morning and fly to Miami where I have a four hour layover and before catching a flight to Lima. After arriving at 9:45 pm, going through immigration, baggage, and customs should be done in about an hour. From there I'll head over to the LAN airline counter and check-in for my 4:20 am flight to Iquitos and the rainforest. That means about 4-5 hours waiting in the airport [View Full Entry]

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