The new Amex lounge at Sea-tac is awesome. Big balcony over the central terminal, breakfast, a bar. Everything you want in life.
Our vacation is later this year. Normally we are flying at the end of June. But it’s mid-August now and we are more than tired. it’s been a nasty summer of unexpected work, emergencies, and general bullshit. And two days ago we learned that Lahaina – our favorite town in Hawaii – is gone. Destroyed in a massive fire in Maui. It’s all too much.
We are heading to Puerto Vallarta now, actually to the same resort we went to last year, but this one is in PV and is regular sized. but hitting another all-inclusive makes things easy. But right now the critical thing is to have a few cocktails and make sure we get to the gate on time. Heading back to the bar now…
Air travel is definitely a bit of a zoo. We are up in the air now but it took us a half hour on the runway to get clearance to take off. This kind of delay hit yulia several times this year since she travels for work a lot. My Brother in law is a pilot and has talked about how post-covid there is a shortage of pilots, and other roles in air travel as well. We may be running late, but we are running.
So many years I have been excited to be heading somewhere new. We have done so many destination vacations where we really want to go see something – London, Paris, etc. Right now we just want to get away. I never appreciated how good a resort could be until last year. The Palladium resort was just over the top – that’s why we joined their club. So we are going to the same thing in a different location. I can’t wait. It’s a smaller resort in Puerto Vallarta than Tulum – but that doesn’t matter. I’m looking forward for the pool and bar. Anything else is gravy.
The resort is about 50 minutes to the north of the town – it’s a bit farther than I was expecting but the beaches look amazing, so I don’t mind the drive. We actually haven’t had good beaches on any trip for a while – even Hawaii was a lot of rock in most areas. So I’m keeping fingers crossed that this will be an improvement from the last few trips. The resort does show a beachside bar – so in the least I can look at sand with a drink in hand.
I’ll take whatever I can get.
We are in First Class on Alaska – the funny thing is that with the cost of Tickets now, plus premium seats for legroom, plus food and drinks – you might as well just get first class for the longer trips like this. It didn’t hurt that we had a companion fare to knock the price down a bit. It’s a great deal. Even better is that things are finally feeling more normal for service. The Attendants are friendly and awesome. Food is great and the drinks are flowing. Hot cookies don’t hurt either.
Interestingly, the guy behind us has a cat. He is an expat who lives in PV, and is telling us *all* about travelling back and forth, how much he loves Mexico, and how his Spanish lessons have just been really difficult. The cat comes with him when he goes back and forth. He’s about three vodka’s in now so I expect it will be nap time soon. **fingers crossed**
Nope. he never passed out. Bastard. But that’s why they invented Noise Cancelling Headphones. The rest of the flight was smooth, and we touched down in the Puerto Vallarta airport. We were the front row, so we got our things and were first off the plane. I was hoping we could get in line at Passport Control and get through without a lot of hassle, so being first off was excellent. We ran through the concrete rat’s maze of the International Arrivals terminal and came out at the rope maze of Immigration.
It was empty. Literally not one single person there.
At first we were concerned that we were in the wrong part of the airport, but we saw some officers waving us over at the opposite corner of the huge room. We went through the ropes and were the first at the desk. Behind us we could see the rest of the passengers filing in, and after just a few questions we were stamped and sent on our way. Best Immigration ever – 5 Stars – would immigrate again.
We then had to find our shuttle. we had one pre-paid from the resort. I learned to pre-pay for the shuttle, especially since we had a 50 minute drive from PV to the resort. Inside the airport we navigated through the desks of guys trying to sell day passes and tours, finally one of them took pity and pointed us to the Grey Line desk. it was easy to find because it was under the ‘Costco” sign and didn’t have anything labeled Grey Line nearby. And look for the guy in the green and white shirt because reasons.
We loaded up, tipped the gentleman helping (Tip: on our last trip we took cash for small things and tips – but since no one takes cash at the resort we were never able to make change. it was a total pain. This time we took a stack of 1’s and 5’s to tip with instead. Thank god I work as a stripper in my spare time.)
The roads weren’t bad – not as nice as those out at Tulum, but this area was a bit older and remote. We pulled into the resort around 6:40pm. Now we just had to check in and the fun would start.
Warm up that cocktail shaker boys.
Cognitive Dissonance 