The plane ride from Dallas to São Paulo was relatively smooth. I ended up sitting next to a woman with a beautiful 9-month old, Amanda, and she did pretty well, considering she was a lap-baby for a 10 hour flight. Or a 7 hour flight followed by a 3 hour flight. About 3 AM Brazil Time (definitely 11 PM PDT, but I may be off by an hour or two) the plane was diverted to Bogota, Columbia. One of the passengers was having medical difficulties — diabetic shock, I think (the captain had asked for some device and mentioned if you were a diabetic you’d know what it was). Two paramedics boarded the plane, and they wheeled a guy off in a wheelchair, and looks like his wife or girlfriend followed him off the plane. We still ended up camping out in Bogota on the plane for another 30 minutes or so — that’s where I’m writing this, as we all have some time to kill on the ground.
Bogota is interesting at 2 AM… it looks like a quiet city, and clearly in a valley of some sorts as there are lights on the hill. We appear to be out in the boondocks, as there aren’t many lights nearby. The airport looks like every other airport from the outside… the familiar walkways are there, and there’s another American Airlines jet parked to one side. Looks like a 757, although perhaps it’s a 767 (what we’re on now… aka the FedEx Cargo Special). It’s interesting to me how a city sleeps…. Even though it’s a completely different country, and has its share of problems, at night and from the air, it looks like any other city.
Amanda and her mother have finally sacked out… luckily, her mother is getting some sleep as well. They’re also heading to Salvador, although they may have a tougher trip than I. I was scheduled to have about a 4-hour layover, so with this side trip I’ll probably arrive in time to make my connection onto Varig. I don’t think they’ll be as lucky, as they only had about an hour and a half to catch a flight on TAM, the other local airline to Brazil. Which means delays and re-routing… I hope they’ll be able to get onto the Varig flight. So far, Amanda’s done well, but clearly hasn’t been happy – there have been a couple crying fits, which you might expect on a 10.5 hour flight. It makes me wonder how well Laura would do on an international flight… probably ok, as at least she’d have her own seat, but it’d still be hard for her, I think.
Anyway, more when we leave… for now, nothing much to do but kick back and wait. Yee-haw!