MileSmiles: What hotels did you stay at during your trip? How far from airport? Use
a shuttle / taxi / ?? Cost? Thanks.


[QUOTE]Originally posted by MileSmiles:
[B]Hi there, came back today from my 500k run.

Well, I'm heading off on a 500K run on 3/28... Doing MIA-SAL-GUA-SJO-BOG-CCS-MIA..

Mahalo to MauiGirl and everybody else who helped produce my itinerary. I'll remember to check in w/the various airlines 3 days prior to departure to be sure that I'm not stuck in Bogota.

Cheers,
ns

An echo to the reconfirmation refrain---remember that in many of these countries aviation is a critical lifeline to remote areas that have limited roads---the airlines operate intensively with limited resources for a local clientele. Reconfirm, reconfirm, reconfirm!

My friends and I are now in LIM to complete our trips for the 1M miles. If all goes well, we be done tomorrow...

Having a great time in Lima. This city seems to stay active all night long, which is good for us since all the flights seem to arrive around midnight and leave around 6 am. Great ice cream and coffee, reasonable prices, friendly people. We got quite a history lesson from our bus driver (in spanish--covered about 3000 years..

Just got back to LAX from my 500k run. Almost all of my flights were very timely, and most connections can be made rather rapidly. Here are my flights and my impressions of the airports.

LAX->GUA Lacsa in Business Flight left about 20 minutes late and arrived 15 minutes early. Sat in row 3 would recommend rows 1 or 2 as 3 does not recline all the way. The crew was great and food was good. Guatamala airport is small and allows for quick connections. You could connect in 15 minutes easy, you do not need to go through customs if you are connecting.

GUA->SAL Aviateca. Business. Very short flight. Flight time is about 30 minutes. Arrived 15 minutes early. Americans who are going to leave the airport need a tourist card. You just buy it at immigration it cost $10. Most other nationalities do not need it (ie Europe).

SAL->MGA TACA Plane was small and hot! MGA is Another place to make quick connections. Make sure to tell someone if you do the same connection that we did which is to a COPA flight because it is a strange combination. This is because the copa flight that we got on originated in SAL, ie we could have stayed on the same plane (in their eyes). I'd say 15-20 minutes to connect. Flight was on time.

MGA->PTY Copa. Business. Good flight. Landed on time. PTY needs a little more time for connections while OAG says 1:30 that is way to long. If you are chaning from copa to avianca (or another Copa) 30 minutes is good I'd say 45 minutes for most other airlines.

PTY->BOG SAM(avianca) The only flight that we had that was late. The 6:50 flight from PTY apparantly never leaves on time. We left at 8:00pm. We stayed in Bogota. Not a bad place to stay at all. I would recommend staying at the Travelodge, close to the airport. The locals know it as "el capital" we paid $84 and they have a free shuttle. The bogota Airport is the most modern of the Airports that we went to. They go through your luggage throughly, If you stay in Bogota you should get there 2 hours early for the flight.

Bog->Miami Aces. Aces is ecomony only. The meals were very good for economy. We had a choice between Veal and Trout, both good.

Anyway i'm back home in less then 48 hours.



[This message has been edited by fabsco (edited 03-13-2000).]

Joseph Stagner, Marc Renson, and I finished up our quest for the 1M mile bonus this morning. All was smooth. The turnaround LIM-CUZ-LIM was made in plenty of time, though the agent at the CUZ check-in counter seemed worried about getting us on the plane.

We were really blown away by Quito. This was, by far, the best LatinPass city we visited. Had a great time walking through the old city. Most things were incredibly inexpensive. A cross-town taxi ride from the airport was $4. We had tasty t-bone steak dinners for $1.76, and ice cream sundaes for $.75. FlyerTalkers, plan to spend some time in Quito!

Pudding Guy,

Congratulations on bagging the million.

What was your itinerary for your recent run? Did you fly from SFO? What hotels did you use?

We're making the 500k run in early April and our thoughts are to use some of the 500k bonus to return to LatinPass country to complete the 1M in June.

ejulber

Hmmm Pudding Guy... congrats.. and thanks for the info.... We are proud that you are flying to earn even more miles..... You bonus guy you....

I am thinking of a good trip (not really Latin Pass related for 500,000 miles) but to see some of hte area.. any good ideas?? Cities not to miss?

Have to agree with PG about Quito - it's an amazing - it's one of my favorite cities in the world. Will post more tonight.

We returned from our 500K mile run yesterday and had a great time. Our goal had been to complete the 6 segments in 28 hours from departing MIA to returning to MIA. Met student and his sister in GUA for a great meal. Also met UpgradeMe on 2 of our flights. Our only problem that others may want to be aware of occurred in MGA.

We arrived in MGA at 8:10 on a Copa flight from GUA. Our connection on TACA was due to leave at 9:55. Immigration told us to wait in the "transit" area for a TACA rep. When no TACA rep appeared we asked a person at the security booth what we should do. She went to the TACA counter (outside of security) and was told that we should continue to wait and an agent will be there shortly. At 9:20 a TACA agent appears and informs me that he did not know we had been waiting. He also told me the flight was overbooked by 30 and we would not have seats on this flight. With only 40 people in the boarding area my travel agent (who was with me on the trip) thought he just did not understand us and demanded from another agent who had arrived to see a supervisor.

I also could not figure out how this flight could be full, until a few minutes later a group of at least 80 children all with "Unescorted Minor" badges appeared.

After boarding was completed the supervisor appeared and told us we would be going on an AA flight in 2 hours. You can imagine his confusion when the 3 gringos in front of him in chorus yelled "NO, we MUST fly a Grupo Taca plane". In the end he agreed to put me and 1 of my companions up for the night with meals and Business Class the next day. The other member of our party chose to go on the Lacsa flight later that day. All 3 of us ended up paying $11 in fees since we were in transit.

the moral of the story being, if connecting from Copa to Taca in MGA, you should collect your boarding pass from the TACA agents in GUA. Do not take no for an answer from them or you will be sorry and have to pay fees to reach the check in desks or risk our situation.


Other things to note:

The Lacsa flight from MGA-MIA, although it keeps the same flight number, required a change of planes in SJO. Thus 2 boarding passes were issued.

We were downgraded on our TACA segment from SJO-SAL when they substitied an Avianca plane with no Business Class. The flight number remained TACA.

Our gate to gate connection time in BOG was exactly 45 minutes. However, it helped that we were the first off an 80 percent FULL 767 from MIA to reach the ONE immigration agent.

Hope everything goes well for the rest of you.

rich

Congrats rich!

I kept looking for FlyerTalkers on my flights, but didn't see any obvious candidates (no one else did the turn-around LIM-CUZ-LIM for example). While waiting in the airports, I'd occasionally yell out, "FlyerTalk?" to see if anyone turned my way. What's the sign, anyway?

I thought about leaving something behind in the Lima airport for the LatinPass FlyerTalkers to sign, but didn't follow through with this idea.

Regarding Rich's problems in MGA, this can be an issue at many of the airports. At Lima, for instance, there didn't seem to be any Aces staff on hand to provide boarding passes. As Rich noted, there's apparently some way to notify the airlines and have them provide boarding passes without leaving, but his experience shows what can go wrong. When we were faced with this situation, we chose to just leave the transit area, wait in line for a boarding pass at the ticket counter, and pay the airport tax when required.

We got pretty tired of paying the airport taxes. We paid three times in Lima! We stayed the night and had to pay $25 for our next day trip on Aces, then $4 for Taca-Peru trip (domestic fee), then another $25 to head back home. No real way to avoid this given our travel plans.

The airport tax rules varied from place to place. In Quito, for instance, we left the airport and spent 12 hours in the city, but weren't required to pay a tax. On the GUA-SAL flight, my friends were asked to check their bags because each weighed more than 10 kg. They then had to leave transit to get their bags and pay the $25 airport tax. One was also charged for a $10 tourist visa! Pretty expensive 30 second walk to get a 11 kg bag.

One more note: If you're planning on spending midnight to 6 am in the Lima airport, don't count on getting much rest. The international terminal was very busy and noisy all night long. The in-transit lounge wasn't so nice, and was hot the night we spent. The back gates were more calm, but LanChile kept rousing us away. Check to see if buying a business class ticket will get you access to the VIP lounge.

To Those that Completed Trip:

1) What were "Transit Lounges" like for Food, Seating, any entrance into Club (ie. Admirals) from Transit area, etc.

2) Please name airport hotels if you stayed at any, cost, shuttle service, etc.

3) Is there a good way to "notify" gate agents that you are in the Transit Lounge so they will come and get you checked in? Sounds like this was the major problem. (Seems if you are "in-transit" there should be a way to get checked in.)

4) If you had "changable tickets", was it easy to reschedule flights.

5) If you used taxis, any problem communicating or with payment?

6) Do you need local currency in all countries (espec. if just in transit)and, if so, how did you get it. Or did most take Dollar bills?

7) Any problems or hints on how to get the LP acct number in the airline record for automatic posting. (Also anyone had probablms with number in Radisson, Hol. Inn, Avis, TWA, etc.?)

Good job on getting back. Hope they post your miles soon. Keep us posted.

Guess thats all. Appreciate the info already given and any more will be of help to all of us who are going over the next 3 months.

Thanks...

[This message has been edited by SAPMAN (edited 03-14-2000).]

Pudding Guy -

I seem to remember you noting that the night-life in LIM does not stop. Could I get into LIM at 12:15, go catch some night-life and then head back to the airport to catch my early morning flight to CUZ?? http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Congratulations to all completing such a fantastic mileage run and of course to pudding guy for his second million miles- the "hard" way!

Back from a 28 hour trip to pick up 500k. Shared two flights in C with RichLond and his entourage. Shared several segments with Student and his friend as well.

To answer several recent questions:

All transfers were a breeze except Bogota. San Salvador is a Taca hub, and you simply walk to your next gate. Also transferred from Copa to Lacsa in San Jose. It took the Lacsa agent a minute to figure out how I could be in the departure area without being checked in, but once I explained that I was in transit, he was o.k. Taca would not let me off Flight 514 in MGA, even though we had a separate boarding pass for the next segment. My friend spent the half hour flirting with the gate agent in the jetway.

Bogota is an experience. It took us an hour to transit, even though we were flying in C. I would guess that you should allow closer to two hours in Y. Thanks to Student for explaining how to avoid the departure tax.

All flights were on time, and service was fine. All announcements were made in English. Overall, it was easy.

"Overall it was easy!" Great attitude! Congratulations!

[This message has been edited by doc (edited 03-14-2000).]

leroy11, I can't say I experienced the Lima discotecas myself. We stayed at the Holiday Inn, which is about 20-30 minutes away from the airport. There seemed to be a lot of entertainment in this area. Can't wait to hear your report...

We stayed: GUA--Radisson; LIM--Holiday Inn; MGA--Intercontinental; and CCS-- Intercontinental. All were nice. Plenty of choices in GUA fairly close to the airport. Hotels were more distant in LIM, MGA & CCS. The Holiday Inn was the least expensive and also had the largest room. I didn't see much in MGA except the Intercontinental.

All airport taxes were listed and paid in US$ . US$ were accepted without exception for taxis, food, and purchases. We had good luck with all our taxis.

Non-Spanish speakers should be fine. Many ticket agents, taxi drivers, and waiters didn't speak English well, but there was usually someone nearby to help. I speak so-so Spanish, which definitely helped us out, although we still ended up with a few surprises--mainly when our food arrived. Once, in trying to order a plain peppercorn hamburger for my friend, I succeeded in ordering two: one plain and one regular. I managed to eat this mistake, just had to order another beer to wash it down. Similarly, I ended up with a "Haiti-style" dinner one night that featured steak, a fried egg, ham, a hot dog, french fries, and fried banana. Again, I ate.

Several of the hotel and rental car agents, and even a few of the airline agents seemed unfamiliar with the LatinPass program. Most everyone was able to figure it out, though.

While travelling, be sure to drink an Inca Kola in Peru and grab some of the famous fried chicken in El Salvador.

UpGradeMe.... I think I missed this if it was discussed before... What tips did student give you to avoid the departure tax? Thanks!

Pudding Guy -

I think I may take the discotecas option - there's 5 of us going so it should be interesting!! A report will follow ... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

We did not have a problem changing from Taca to Copa at MGA. The trick was we told a person there before we got to immigration, as we were walking up the walkway. That person took us through a door (bypassing immagration) and to the gate. They had us wait in the bording area and had an agent bring up the passes. (in some cases it helps to speak spanish.) But for all of our connections we tried to let everyone know when we did not have boarding passes. They always went to get them for us.
We did not have to pay departure tax on any of our connecting flights. In Bogota if you stay the night be sure to get a slip when you check in for your flight that allows you to pay 1/2 of the departure tax. I think you also save if you pay in pesos. We paid in dollars but found out later that it would have been cheaper to pay in pesos.

[This message has been edited by fabsco (edited 03-15-2000).]

Fabsco:

Where did you stay in BOG just in case?!

Congrats to all of you who have completed your runs and thanks for all of the valueable tips! My husband and I leave Maui on the evening of the 15th for MIA. We will begin the first half of our million mile run on the 18th, getting back into MIA on the 21st. Will let you know how it goes. The second leg is booked for the beginning of May. Anyone else going this weekend? Aloha!! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I am considering going for the 500K miles, but had a few questions for those of you that have/are going for the bonus.

What do you plan to do with all of those miles you get on LatinPass? Which airline are you going to transfer them to? Besides using Hilton HHonors, is there any other way to use the LatinPass miles on non-latinpass member airlines?

In my case, having miles on the LatinPass member airlines is not very beneficial.

Thanks.

Phil

The short answer is that you can redeem the points for trips on the partner airlines i.e. TWA,National,USAirways and KLM. Look at the "Award Tables" entry on the LatinPass page (www.latinpass.com)

We stayed at Travelodge. It is the closest place to the airport. The locals know it as "el capital". We paid 84 dollars for the night. They have shuttles to the airport in the morning and very nice rooms. The taxi driver had plenty of cheaper of hotels to recommend, but we stuck with this one (recommend by immagration in bogota.) It is about 10 minutes from the airport.

We stayed at Travelodge. It is the closest place to the airport. The locals know it as "el capital". We paid 84 dollars for the night. They have shuttles to the airport in the morning and very nice rooms. The taxi driver had plenty of cheaper of hotels to recommend, but we stuck with this one (recommend by immagration in bogota.) It is about 10 minutes from the airport.
Also there are a ton of atms on the departure floor.

Has anyone had miles actually post to their LatinPass account? If so how long did it take? I am now past 4 weeks on my Thrifty Rental Car.

rich

Has anyone had miles actually post to their LatinPass account? If so how long did it take? I am now past 4 weeks on my Thrifty Rental Car.

rich

Neither my car rental nor my hotel stays have posted yet.

Neither my car rental nor my hotel stays have posted yet.

I just had my 500K run from MIA booked and ticketed today for travel at the end of this month. My itinerary is:
MIA-BOG AV9 10-00am-1.30pm
BOG-SJO LR690 3.00pm-4.10pm
SJO-SAL TA560 4.50pm-6.09pm
SAL-GUA GU960 6.49pm-7.39pm
next day
GUA-MGA CM317 7.15am-8.20am
MGA-MIA TA515 9.55am-1.25pm

All booked in J or C class on one ticket, except the MGA-MIA segment, which is on a separate ticket and in economy (M class). Total cost of GBP921 (approx USD1380). The MIA-BOG on AV is a real bargain, at approx USD330 in business (would have been circa USD150 in economy), about half the price of the MGA-MIA on TA. This will leave me the four 'southern' airlines (Aces, Aeropostal, Saeta and Taca-Peru) and perhaps some tourism for another trip if I eventually decide to go for the 1M.

I noted RichLond's comments on connecting from CM317 to TA515 in MGA and UpgradeMe's warning on the need to be quick off the plane at BOG (thanks to both of you). The other thing I am slightly nervous about is the tight connections (40 mins) at SJO and SAL between LR/TA and TA/GU. Anybody knows whether the LR check-in agent at BOG will be able to check me though to GUA, since LR, TA and GU are all Grupo Taca airlines? Alternatively, anybody knows whether I can go to the check-in desks of LR and TA (and GU, if they have any) at MIA and check-in there for a flight later that day within Latin America?

I have not booked a hotel in GUA yet. I am thinking of booking a room at the Marriott, since (a) it is one of the Latinpass partners and a stay there will contribute to the 500K requirements and (b) it is not too far from the airport and provides a shuttle service. Any comment on this hotel or any alternative?

From one of Pudding Guy's messages, I understand that it could be helpful to speak some Spanish in difficult moments. I can more or less just about get by in ordinary Spanish but have no notion of air travel lingo (things like 'through check-in' or 'landside/airside', etc...). Anybody knows of an online source of air-speak Spanish vocabulary?

Also, did anybody come across any lower carry-on allowances than the 10Kg on GUA-SAL that Pudding Guy mentioned? With my itinerary, I definitely do NOT want to find myself having to check in any hold luggage.

Something which might be useful for those non-US nationals transiting via the US who normally rely on the Visa-Waiver programme to enter the US: you may want to check that the South or Central American airline you plan to return to the US with participates in the programme, otherwise you may well have to get a US transit visa. TA is OK, and I would suspect that LR is too, but I would not be 100% sure about Aces, Aeropostal or Saeta (if or when they resume UIO-MIA flights).

(apologies: duplicate message)

[This message has been edited by NickB (edited 03-15-2000).]

(and again...)

[This message has been edited by NickB (edited 03-15-2000).]

Nick:

Any Grupo Taca airline agent should be able to check you in for all Grupo Taca flights.

We stayed at the Marriott GUA. Nice hotel, especially at $95. Airport shuttle runs every 30 minutes. However, RichLond would probably tell you to save $30 and stay at the Radisson.

I see it is taking a long time to get LP partner activity posted. Anyone had any hotels, rental cars, or other airlines posted yet?? If so, how long did it take (and please mention the partner.)

I want to know how long to wait until I start to voice my concerns.

NickB,

that was our EXACT itinerary and you will be amazed at the service on the Avianca Business Class flight!! However, u will sweat all the extra calories off when u arrive in Bogota.

We were also worried about the tight connections, but had no problems what so ever. The Aviateca flight was actually held a few minutes for connecting passengers when our Bogota flight was delayed. You will be checked in for all your TACA flights in Bogota. They will also take all 3 of your TACA flight coupons.

I would strongly recommend the "All-Suite" Radisson in Guatemala. We were able to obtain a 65USD rate using a web saver. The taxi from the airport was 7USD and we took a free airport shuttle from the hotel back to the airport. There are some great places to eat right outside the hotel.

In reference to the Copa to Taca connection in MGA. I would strongly recommend you get the boarding passes at the GUA Taca desk. However that said, I am pretty pleased we got bumped. Sue and I were not scheduled to return to DC until Monday, so rather than sleeping at the Miami Airport Farfield Inn, we got to spend an extra day in MGA at a top notch hotel with all meals paid. The upgrade to business was a bonus.

Good Luck and have fun,
rich

RichLond, NickB
I was wanting to book the same itinerary but I need help.
In NickB's post, the 4th leg says GU 960 6:49 - 7:39
When I look that up, Flt 960 shows being an Aviateca @ 6:25 - 7:10
Grupo Taca shows Flt 514 6:49 - 7:39
Which airline is the 6:49 flight on?
Thanks

Tomphot,

You are right. The Aviateca flight is now departing earlier. This was not the case last week when we did our mileage run. My belief is that you would still be able to make that connection quite easily in SAL assuming no delays from SJO.

rich

Tomphot: on the date I am traveling in two weeks' time, the timing is still 6:49. The 6.25 departure seems to be a seasonal change for the spring/summer. I take some comfort from Rich's comment that Aviateca might be ready to hold the flight for connecting passengers. As this must be the plane's last rotation of the day and as the chances of there being passengers on the flight connecting to another flight out of GUA are limited, there is a reasonable likelihood that they would hold it if need be.

Rich, looking forward to that AV flight. On the MGA connection, I have factored in an extra day in MIA before returning to Ireland to allow for contingencies, so if everything goes well up to MGA, I could tempt fate. I am somewhat nervous that the next day flight might be full though, which would leave me in a pickle, so I'll probably follow your advice and get the boarding pass at GUA.

On hotels, the Radisson does indeed look good value. Can't get the USD65 rate, as I'll be there on a weekday, but they have a weekday rate of USD80 (compared with USD119 at the Marriott), so I may end up there. Apparently, you can get the shuttle from the airport to the hotel too if you ask them in advance.


[This message has been edited by NickB (edited 03-20-2000).]