The Intro
Well, that was an adventure. Traveling hundreds of thousands of miles over the past decade, while there have been occasional delays, cancellations, and unexpected issues that have arisen, we have been pretty fortunate with our travels and are both adaptable when necessary and keep relatively calm under pressure. This required both adaptability and a cool calmness that approaches an entirely new level.
The Trip Setup
NSPwife and I traveled to South America in 2013. The impetus behind the trip was that a good friend of ours was getting married in Lima, Peru. Coincidentally, this was the first miles and points trip I ever booked. We flew business class on United and Copa Airlines from Cleveland to Chicago to Panama to Buenos Aires. We stayed at the Park Hyatt in Buenos Aires, and were immediately hooked. This was our first lounge access trip. Our first business class trip. Our first 5-star hotel experience on points. And what a way to start. It continued flying LATAM business class to Santiago, Chile, where we headed to Colchagua Valley, stayed at a Vineyard and got engaged. We continued in business class on LATAM to Lima, then finished off our journey on Air Canada in business class in our private pods. There was no going back.
While we loved South America, Southeast Asia has a special place in our hearts, and other than a trip to Mauritius and South Africa, we have steadfastly explored the various countries in Southeast Asia. We decided it was finally time to break that habit, and return to South America. We had looked at Rio, Patagonia, and a few other locations, but given NSPwife was carrying NSPbabysister in her belly, we were restricted to non-Zika zones. Thus, we had to find high-altitude locations. We loved Santiago, Chile, but only spent a night there on our previous trip, so we decided to hit that up for a day on our way to Mendoza, Argentina. Who doesn’t like Malbec, steak, the Andes, and some potential adventure activities. So that was our agenda.
The Flights
- Chicago O’Hare to Panama City, Panama – Copa Airlines Business Class: 60,000 miles per person + $20.55 total
- Panama City to Santiago, Chile – Copa Airlines Business Class: Continuation from above
- Santiago, Chile to Mendoza, Argentina – LATAM Airlines Economy 6,000 miles per person +$26.40
- Mendoza, Argentina to Santiago, Chile – LATAM Airlines Economy: 14,500 miles per person + $235.26 total
- Santiago, Chile to Lima, Peru – LATAM Airlines Economy: Continuation from above
- Lima, Peru to Miami, Florida – American Airlines Business Class: 30,000 miles per person + $116.72
- Miami, Florida to Chicago O’Hare – American Airlines Business Class: Continuation from above
That totaled: 339,000 miles and $398.93 for round-trip mostly business class flights to South America for three people.
The Hotels
We used our IHG free night certificate that comes with the Chase IHG card for Santiago to stay at the InterContinental. While the certificate is free, the cost for the card is $49 per year, so let’s consider the price for the night at $49.
In Mendoza, we stayed at the Park Hyatt. NSPwife has Globalist status, mostly from spend on her World of Hyatt credit card. So for 12,000 points per night and an applied suite upgrade, we rocked a Park Hyatt for four nights for a total of 48,000 points and no dollars.
Total cost for five nights at nice hotels was 48,000 points and $49.
The Start
We took off for the airport at 6:20am to catch a 9:00am flight. It should be a 50-minute drive at that hour, giving us enough time to casually check-in, head to a lounge for a bite to eat and drink, and then board the plane. All was going well, our scheduled Uber was perfectly on time, and the roads were looking good. Then we hit some traffic. I popped open Google Maps only to see something that seemed like it couldn’t possibly be right: An hour and fifteen minute proposed delay due to an accident that was right at a point where alternate routes weren’t an option. Surely they would clear the accident soon and traffic would resume. Only, they did not, and it did not. I anxiously watched the airport arrival time creep on, ultimately set at 8:28am and not budging in either direction, and begin thinking through our options:
- Beg the gate agents to check our bags, stating it was OK if they didn’t make our plane and could go on a later flight
- There was space available on the 2:40pm flight. That would be worst case scenario. We had a central market tour and cooking lesson in Santiago the next morning at 8am that we would miss. And the thought of flying a red-eye on non-lie-flat seats with a four year old seemed like a bad way to start the trip
- NSPwife and NSPpeanut could possibly get to the plane, and I would check luggage and take the 2:40pm flight. FML, but at least the other two could be on their way
- We had a baby stroller and car seat, each with their own bags. We could take all of our clothes/toiletries/shoes/packed items out of our one large suitcase and throw them in the stroller & car seat bags to gate-check. I was not sure if that was frowned upon or admissible
The Uber pulled up and I ran with the two bags we were going to check to the Copa counter. NSPwife was taking care of NSPpeanut and our carry-ons. I flew to the counter. It was a ghost town. No one to be seen. I yelled a few times hoping someone from Copa would be in the back. No luck. We decided that we were going with option #4. The transfer of items began in full force, items thrown ravishly out of the suitcase and into the stroller bag. and we left our suitcase behind. Only a couple hours later I feared the worst: did we leave the suitcase in the middle of the terminal or did we push it by a trash can? Was O’Hare Terminal 5 now on lockdown because an abandoned suitcase was found there? Nerves kicked in during the end of our next flight and lasted until touch-down and a quick google news search.
We were lucky…the night before I downloaded boarding passes on a whim to my phone. Typically, I wouldn’t bother for international flights. So we had boarding pass documents to get us through security. Security said we had too many bags. I explained they were gate-check items that were approved by Copa. Luckily security really couldn’t care less about what was going on. That worked. They shrugged and let us pass. There was no security line, thank goodness. And Copa allows TSA Pre-Check. So we scrambled through quickly.
We got to the gate, grabbed our gate-check tags, and were some of the last ones on the plane. Somehow. Somehow, we made it. Sweaty, out of breath, but relieved. I really needed that pre-departure beverage…
