We FINALLY made it to Brazil!

International travel is pretty exciting, but you have to get there first! We set out on Friday morning, Aug 15th, for Brazil to tour Ty's mission (& see a few other sights that weren't in his mission). Unfortunately, our American Airlines flight out of SFO was delayed because 2 of their toilets were not opperating properly and the pilot decided that it was not healthy to fly all the way to Miami with 190+ passengers & 2 out of 4 toilets not working. Four hours later, they were not successful in fixing the toilets so they decided to fly to Dallas (with the same 2 toilets not working), change planes, then continue onto Miami; however, this meant that we were going to miss our AA connection into Rio & they only make one flight a day, so we would have to wait until the next NIGHT to get to Rio (Well, this would also mean that we would not get there in time for our tour & we'd miss an entire day in Rio) - soooo, they re-routed us on TAM, a Brazilian Airline, for the next morning & gave us a hotel voucher to "take a nap" once we got to Miami. Well after we waited for them to remove some fuel from the tanks (something about not wanting to land with too much fuel on board incase of an emergency landing?) we were happy to be on our way. When we got to Dallas, it took them 2 hours to move us from one gate to the very next gate for our "quick" change of airplanes.

We finally got into Miami at 3:00 AM, went to the hotel so we could rest & take a shower before we needed to be back to the airport at 9:00 AM to make our 11:05 AM TAM flight to Rio via Sao Paulo; however, when we got to the airport we learned that our Rio flight "didn't exist" - AA had made an error. The flight they booked us on was actually scheduled for 6:00 PM that evening! So we went back to AA to complain & try to get back on our original AA flight (a day later) but they had already filled our seats. #1 - What were we going to do in Miami all day with no luggage? #2 - This newest delay was going to cause us to miss our Tour in Rio anyway! We called the tour company & they were able to split our tour up into an afternoon tour & a morning tour the next day before we were scheduled to leave Rio for Iguasu. Of course they gave us a hotel voucher so that we could go back to the SAME hotel that we just checked out of & "take a nap" before returning to the airport for the 6:00 PM flight.

Well...the saga continues...when we got back to the airport...our NEW 6:00 PM flight was delayed & what's worse? NO ONE KNEW WHERE OUR LUGGAGE WAS - both AA & TAM said they have NO WAY OF TRACKING IT!!! Our luggage was either going to show up at AA baggage claim in Rio or if it made the transfer, it would be at the TAM baggage claim at Rio or...it would be stuck in Miami until who knows when?

Hopeful...we returned to the airport to catch the 6:00 PM TAM flight and what do you think we find??? Yes, ANOTHER delay! We waited & they kept bumping the time every 30 minutes, "waiting for maintenance to change the engine." As anxious as I was to get on the flight...I did NOT want maintenance to feel rushed in anyway if they were actually "changing the engine" I was about to get on!!! They finally switched our gate & plane assignment with the 9:00 PM flight & made them wait for the plane whose engine was being "changed" because we had been waiting for 3 hours already! Alas...we were in the air at 9:00 PM & arrived in Sao Paulo at 6:30 AM only to find that we would not be able to clear customs & make our connection to Rio in time.

Once again they were going to bump us to the 1:00 PM flight into Rio which would cause us to miss our tour altogether so they sent us on their inter-terminal shuttle to their domestic airport so we could make an earlier flight into Rio in an effort to make it in time for our tour. So a 45 minute bus ride to a different airport, we were able to catch a flight to Rio to a different airport, a 45 minute taxi, we finally made it to the hotel, one hour before our tour.

Happy ending to a very long story & an even longer ordeal? Almost...we enjoyed our tour to Sugar Loaf Mountain & a walk along the Copacabana Beach - but as suspected...after our tour, no one knew where our luggage was! TAM did not have it at either airport and since AA only has one flight per day, no one was at their baggage claim. Paul made several phone calls & was unable to track down our luggage. He was told that he would have to call back in the morning. We went to bed frustrated & discouraged because we had already been in the same clothes for 3 days & weren't excited about wearing them another day.

That night at midnight, we were awakened by a phone call...our luggage had been delivered! The next day we enjoyed our tour to Corcovado, Christ the Redeemer Statue in clean clothes - after which, Paul & Ty quickly changed into their swim trunks & ran across the street to swim in the ocean for 9 1/2 minutes before we had to leave for the airport on our way to Iguasu Falls.

PICTURES COMING SOON.....