Earlier in the blog I sang the praises of the seamless way in which a lot of the transportation was organised, it seems we were spoilt at the beginning of the trip.
This morning our bags were collected from our rooms and taken to the lobby, there we identified them and the hotel staff took them to the coach. This time there were no advanced luggage tags or boarding passes.
At Cusco airport we were given boarding passes, with very few couples being seated together. We then went to the normal checking line to check the bags, the slippery downward slope had begun (even if it was only a first world problem!) The flight back to Lima was fine, and we only had a 30 minute layover before our flight to Santiago. Again the flight was fine, taking just over 3 hours.
In Santiago we had to lineup for immigration, there were only 2 officers on duty to handle all the arrival and one of those officers was only handling 1 person in the time it took the other to process 4. Next we had to line up to have our checked bags inspected. It seems as though Chile is even more strict about the importing of food, animal products, dairy products etc. than Australia. The only consolation was, that by the time we got to the baggage hall, our bags were looking for us, not the other way around!
Once through customs, we then had a “short” walk to the coach. This short walk involved taking all our bags on a 20 minute marathon journey in 30C (87F) temperatures and high humidity at an Olympic medal winning pace. Needless to sayafter the previous weeks exertions there were many unhappy and very exhausted tourists.
At the hotel, even though they had been forewarned of our arrival, there were no staff to take care of the luggage, so we dragged it into the hotel ourselves! Once in the lobby we had 70 tourists and one check in agent! Well done Marriott!
I know the issues we had are minor in the big scheme of things, but having seen how well things had been organised, it was disappointing to see how the standards had slipped.
At least they offered free booze with dinner.