To call this a day in Peru is a complete misnomer but the travel day is always part of the process so it has to count. The initial flight was to Newark International Airport. I haven't been to Newark in around 24 years. I was given first class for the flight which was nice for a couple reasons. The plane was a few minutes late to arriving and they let the first class board after the first class cabin was finished being cleaned but everyone else had to wait a bit longer before they let them in. Not that it meant much difference but I always feel waiting in the terminal is akin to waiting in line and hate being in line so would rather board as fast as I can. First class also meant I was given a package of cookies. The flight was very short and they stayed at low altitude. It was a beverage service only flight otherwise. Honestly there was little to report about it. I had a window seat which I don't typically but in first class it really isn't an issue. The were no bumps and it was over quick.
Landing in Newark it was a fair sized walk in terminal C to get to my new gate but I didn't have to recheck security or anything like that. I did not care for the gate layout for gate 136 which had no seats near the entry point, only a fair distance away. I bought and ate a slice of pizza from a small stand named The Famous Famiglia and had part of a root beer with it. It was a reasonably ok piece of pizza. The wait for boarding was about an hour and a half in total and it wasn't terrible. Being Premier with United I got Economy Plus seats and earlier boarding as well. The plane was full but getting on early is the key to having someplace for in your overhead. I know there are people who like to wait as long as possible but they have to live with only items they would be willing to jam under the seat in their foot space. The flight was also mostly uneventful and only had a few spots of bumps. It was 7 hours long though. I watched movies since the time change was only 1 hour as they do not do DST in Peru. My first set of headphones they gave me was broken (I forgot to bring my own thanks to hasty packing). I got a second set. The in seat entertainment unit had an issue that caused it to blackout and skip while playing the movies but it was not terrible enough to bark about it, just annoying. I first watched John Carter and kind of liked it. I will need to see it on a more realistic screen at some point. I had a hard time reading the subtitles when in Martian. The biggest name in the movie I think was Mark Strong who was Lord Blackwell in the first Sherlock Holmes and was also in a couple other Guy Ritchie films. Still it was enjoyable enough that I will try to watch it in better resolution at some point I think. The thing is the movie was so poorly marketed that it bombed despite being an ok movie. I think it might have helped if there was someone more famous in it. After that was done I watched a Japanese movie called The Wings of The Kirin which was a murder mystery though not a suspense thriller. It was sort of like a Japanese version extended CSI episode or something. I liked it anyway. Finally, I watched Warhorse which was obviously a kids movie but not bad anyway. I think even with the lower resolution and small blackouts I wouldn't need to watch it again. Nominally WWI is involved but I think it is fairly external. In any event I did like it enough not to turn it off. The in flight food was terrible so I basically ate the salad, roll and half the actual meal before the soft brownie. Though it was an international flight they didn't have free beer and wine. Not a big deal but I guess a little disappointing.
We landed at about 8:30pm or so then the long trek through immigration (I got very luck on line choice there and managed very quick processing) then waiting for baggage pickup which I think I was the second last bag off the plane, at least it felt that way. You win some and lose some on that front. I won the last time and lost this time. Then on to customs which was quick and painless. Cesar and Luis were waiting in the main hall to pick me up. Luis has a nice Renault. The drive was about 40-45 minutes it felt though I didn't check my watch. They got me to the hotel, which is the DoubleTree El Pardo in Lima, and check in was relatively painless so I was basically at the room and mostly exhausted by about 10:45 or so. After a quick unpacking I basically headed right to bed but without sufficient wind-down time so I took a bit longer to fall asleep than I normally would. In any event there were a couple hours in Peru so it does count.
The couple pictures from the day can be found here.
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