Well yesterday I made it to Villahermosa. I had some wonders at times if I was going to be stuck in Mexico City…? At the start of this fiasco I was given boarding passes for my first two flights but they could not issue one for the AreoMexico flight in OKC… I would have to check in to get that pass but was assured I had a “reserved” seat… yep assured?
The first part of my trip was pretty good. I got some upgrades on my AA flights and even flew into Mexico City “Business Class”… but then things went down hill fast. They told us on the plane that we would need to pick up some “Customs Declaration Cards” as they didn’t have any on the plane. we did get the “immigration” forms to get through passport control… we landed at one end of the airport and the passport control was almost to the other end… Since I was connecting on I was not sure where to go and if I had to pick up my checked bag and walk it through Customs but figured it had to be a lot like entering the US so I got in line anyway… the passport control line took over an hour… and there was no one to ask if I was in the right line, if I could get the customs form, etc.…
Just before I got to passport one lady came by and I got a chance to ask… yes the customs forms are in the next area, and I would need to get my checked bag and take to the “re-check” belt… ok? that must be further down…good thing I had 2 hours between flights… well I did get through passport… found my box waiting for me… got another guy that wanted to help , for money, and I thought what the heck so I asked him where we go and he knew and took off with my box… he did have an airport badge so I figured he was ok…
We got the next belt and I gave him a few bucks and he was happy and I was ok and he indicated I needed to go out, and up and catch the train to Terminal 2… Huh? so once out that door I picked up another “airport badge” guy and he lead me to the proper stairs and got me through a check point and told me I would come out at point M and had to go to point L2 to check in for my flight since I did not have a pre-check, I paid him a couple more bucks… ok…
The train was slow… waited almost 7 minutes for the train to get to me and then about 8 minutes to get to terminal 2… I jogged down the stairs, over and out at Station M and down to “L2” and checked in and they looked at my stuff and the time and I ended up with a “standby” ticket… I was told I was late to check in and they could only issue standby and I needed to go back to station M, go through security again, then down that long hall to gate 72… well crap how could I have been any faster?
Lucky I got through security pretty fast… got to gate 72 and was early… by 30 minutes? huh? but I still had to wait to see if I could get a seat… They asked if anyone would wait but everyone got on the plane… they sent a guy to check and just by that much luck…. they had one seat left and I got on the plane. Oh boy going to make it anyway… we started to back out…. and someone behind me about 8 rows got upset… 2 stewardess were helping her and we were in a holding position until they could get her calmed down… or off… the plane pulled over to another holding area out of the way and the lady next to me went back and helped… guess she was a nurse or something as she came back and said the other lady was excited and was hyper-ventilating and she got her to breath into a “throw-up bag” and calmed down a little but they had already called for medical and security so we sat through that until they were sure things were ok for us to go (about an hour) and then we were off…
I did get to Villahermosa… I was late… but my contact was there waiting on me so all was ok… we got to the hotel and checked in and I called home and crashed…
In all this I should of taken pictures but was too damn busy just trying to make things work out that I never got a chance to get pictures… it would have been more interesting if I had – I think?
Today we worked, and I did get a few pictures.
Road art?
It appears they really like the color in houses… not many browns and earth tones here…
For dinner tonight we went to a place that had buffet salad… and meats till you yell stop!…
The give you a round card that is green on one side and reddish on the other… you leave the green up as long as you want to sample the meats…
they bring them around and cut off fresh pieces as long as you can stand it… This was bacon wrapped chicken on one side and beef on the other…
I did have a salad…
but sampled way too much of the other… prime rib, parmesan chicken, sausage, all kinds of stuff and all grilled on those big sticks… I may need to skip a meal or two now?
WD0AJG