Ugh title edit needed: I realize MP is in Peru. Should be Machu Picchu and Lima. Carry on...
Preamble: Needing to tick off my 6th and final inhabited continent, I went to planning. Peru won out, with no reciprocity fee and great sights. Mom krazykanuck also decided to join. So you may wonder, why not take the UA direct flight to LIM? Great question, but UA didn't release any r/t saver Y or J seats while I was planning this trip, and I was not about to pay 90k UA miles for standard r/t in Y.
So as we (I?) say in reward redemptions, "mo segments, mo problems!"
Here's what the trip looked like:
AA F/J IAH-DFW-MIA-LIM
Avianca Y LIM-CUZ
Tambo del Inka, SPG Luxury Collection
Sacred Valley and Aguas Calientes
Machu Picchu
Cuzco, HGI Cuzco, and Avianca J CUZ-LIM
Hilton Miraflores and Lima
AA J/F LIM-MIA-IAH
So as luck would have it I woke up 1 minute before my alarm. Imagine that. Anyway I was at the airport and through TSA around 5:25 am, so I decided to hit the Centurion Lounge for a bite. Thankfully they brought the hot food out 5 mins ahead of schedule at 5:55. I grabbed a serving of those amazing potatoes and sausage and hiked it back to A.
AA 2244, IAH-DFW
4B
I arrived after boarding had started and boarded va the Priority lane. This plane was odd in that first class started with row 3 and went on from there. The guy in 3A was visibly confused when he boarded late, went to the 3rd row, looked up, walked backwards down the aisle and took his seat.
Also the AA PDB count: 0/1. The FAs who were at least the same age of my grandmother (and I’m being generous here) didn’t bother to make a single move that wasn’t required. No attempt at PDBs despite there being more than enough time. They were too busy chatting in the galley.
Post take off we got our beverage of choice and the AA snack basket. Oh joy, everybody said. I suppose in all fairness its better than my last AA F flight in May where they didn’t bother to load the snack basket, or offer PDBs…
Long awaited Bloody Mary
Overall another completely underwhelming AA F flight.
Beautiful morning at DFW
DFW Centurion Lounge
I had planned to just duck into an Admirals Club given my short 1 hr connection, but my departure gate was D17 (which is immediately down the escalator from the CL) and there was a huge line to get into the D Admirals Club.
Despite the slightly odd layout of having the bathrooms and quiet areas on one side, it’s a nice club. The bartender made me a mean Bloody Mary and I sampled my 2nd breakfast of the day.
Post beverage and food I wondered down just as they announced boarding for first class, so I wondered onboard.
AA 1596, DFW-MIA
757
Now I’m not sure if I read the seat map right and didn’t dig further, or what, but either way our ride to MIA was a 757 with angled lie flat seats in J. ALL RIGHT!
PDB Count 1/2 . The FA came around with juice or water on a tray and when I said no thanks (perhaps with a scowl) she asked if I’d like something different and I got a Bloody Mary.
Breakfast was the ubiquitous strata. No pics because yours truly dropped his phone and it fell between the left armrest and the seat. It took the FA’s flashlight and pressing a ton of the buttons on the seat to get access to it, but we got it back. If anybody of you were on that flight and saw a guy lying in the aisle, that was me!
We also found a couple of chocolates and an earring under there. Paging cleAAning to the 757s…
Service on this flight was fantastic. We had 2 flight attendants that were at least within 20 years of my age, who were great with the meals and proactively bringing drink refills, and helping find lost phones.
OK, phone back and breakfast done. This FA is on my level. I ask for a bloody mary and she brings me one with an extra shot and the can of mix. This is more my speed! I love a vodka float as much as the next guy, but would it have been *that* hard to at least give the drink a good stir before you served it?
Anyway we land in MIA after flying through turbulence related to tropical depression 9 (to become Hurricane Hermine).
I’d planned to lounge hop a bit, but I spent too long on the phone at the Centurion Lounge that I decided to camp out there and not go find the AA Premium Lounge in E. While I wasn’t too hungry I tried the chicken on offer, which was delicious. I spent the rest of the time drinking the Green Flash IPA and making plans for Peru.
AA 972, MIA-LIM
Another 757
I didn’t have a BP for this flight, so I went down 35 mins before departure, got a BP and immediately got on the plane. Turns out we had an equipment swap (or the seat map just lied) and we went from a 1-2-1 to a 2-2-2 in J. No bueno, as I had selected an A seat.
PDB’s were offered and amenity kits were handed out as Y was boarding. I had pre-ordered the beef, which was confirmed when the FAs came around for dinner orders.
This equipment was definitely a step down from the prior flight, as this 757 didn’t have personal at seat entertainment. Not a huge deal for me since I planned to sleep much of the flight, but would be a disappointment if you expected to watch TV/movies.
So let’s get to the food:
Nuts and Malbec to begin
Appetizer; quinoa, beet, goat cheese, and a couple other ingredients, served with a salad
Main: steak, served with potatoes, mushrooms, and spinach
Dessert; AA sundae
The verdict: overall a decent meal. Though I like goat cheese and quinoa, the appetizer was a bit of an odd mish mash of ingredients that didn’t together. The main was fantastic for plane beef. The beef was actually pretty good, and while it looks in the pictures to be on the well done side, it was decently tender and tasty. The potatoes, mushrooms, and spinach were great! No complaints with dessert, as the ice cream was delicious. I had it with berries and hot fudge sauce. The Malbec they were serving with dinner was also perfectly drinkable.
After dessert I read my book for a bit and then went to sleep until we landed in Lima.
While it was a bit of a set back to have the aircraft not match expectations, the service from the Lima based crew was awesome and the food exceeded my hurdle.
A night at LIM
Mom was arriving a couple hours after me, so I hung out at the Starbucks on the 2nd floor until her B6 FLL-LIM flight landed around 10:30 pm. We killed the time until 1:30 am (when security opens for domestic flights) by drinking coffee at Dunkin Donuts and checking in for our onward Avianca flight to CUZ.
At 1:30 we were through security and went to the VIP lounge, which was pretty crappy but it was better than the terminal. We found some comfy chairs, had a couple drinks, and napped until we had to go to the gate for our flight. There was no food besides crackers, and the free drinks were limited to beer, wine, and pisco sours.
AV839
LIM-CUZ
This flight went out of the bus gates on the lower level of the terminal. There appeared to be no attempt at organized boarding, they called the flight and the hoard stormed the gate. We boarded from both ends of the plane today, and with seats in row 19 put us the same distance either way. Load was probably ~75% in Y. Cabin looked kind of worn out vs. what you’d expect to see in the US.
I was beyond exhausted so I slept the whole time, but they came around with drinks and snack bars. Beautiful views though flying near the snow capped mountains. Look for photos in the return flight.
At the airport the Priority tags worked and our bags were out first (thanks United status!). The driver I hired through Taxidatum was there and we were off to do a morning tour of the Pizac ruins and market and then drive us to Ubarumba and drop us at the Tambo del Inka.
Tambo del Inka, SPG Luxury Collection
Room booked: standard room
Room received: deluxe room
We arrived at the hotel around noon and our room was already prepared. Very nice check in process as they sat us on the big leather couches, offered coffee or coca tea, while they processed our documents.
The room was beautiful and had all the amenities we could want, including a terrace with a perfect mountain view and a view of the decorative fountain. The walk in cluset was more than large enough for our short stay, while the bathroom was awesome; I loved the shower.
After cleaning up from barely sleeping in the airport and our morning ruin tour, we went to the lobby for a late lunch on the patio.
We had an order of the fried local potato appetizer to share, while for the main Mom had the vegetable focaccia flatbread and I had the alpaca burger. For drinks, Mom had one of the local cocktails and I stuck to a Barbarian 174 IPA, from a Lima brewery.
Complimentary bites served at the bar
Trio of local potatoes
Delicious burger
We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing around the pool, napping, and generally just taking in the relaxing day. In the evening we revisited the lobby bar to redeem my free welcome drinks. The weather cools off significantly at night, so the hotel has propane heaters to keep the patio comfortable. Same as in the afternoon, we had great service from the same server and the drinks were perfect. Mom loved her hot Sangria while I had a pisco based drink served very artfully.
Hot tub, cold tub, and 2nd pool
Drinks!
Subpar photo of the patio
The next morning I made sure to pick up our train tickets from the Perurail office which is on property (located on the walk between the main entrance and the train station). While the hotel has an on property station, very few trains depart from it and the timing didn’t work for me. On this day I think the only train departed for Machu Picchu ~6 am which was just far too early.
The hotel ordered me a taxi to take us to the Ollayantambo ruins, pick us up, and take us to the train station for S/100.
Up next: Sacred Valley and the train to Aguas Calientes