Hey all:

I've been an a.net member for a while now, and always an enthusiast of any trip report (specially involving AV and Colombia, which fellow a.neter RICARIZA is a specialist), and although I've done my share of trips this is the first time I take some time for this. Here it is (Sorry for my lousy english):

[b]Background[b]

After having a really full load of work 2nd semester, I decided to give my wife and I a few days away from everything, and leave our only child here in Bogota, but after trying to book PTY and CUR, my hopes were rapidly vanishing. On the last week of December, while we were driving to the near town of Anapoima, and she mentioned that on Avianca.com there was a offer to MIA for USD 119 each way, plus additional cost such as fuel surcharge and taxes, ended up being around USD 420 for each one (That included emigration taxes for both Colombia and the US). Inmediately, I grabbed my phone, gave them a call, and voila, few minutes later I received our e-tickets in my blackberry, confirming our trip for Martin Luther King's weekend.. Finally, some days off, and some malls to "attack".

January 17/2008
BOG-MIA
AV 008
Scheduled departure: 6:15 PM
Actual departure: 8.30 PM
Actual flight Time: 3.20 hrs
Load: 100% J
99% Y (Only 3 seats available)

Aircraft:

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Photo © Giovanni Verbeeck

I decided to take this evening flight for just one reason, I could work all day and have a quick ride to the airport from my office, and meet my wife there. Being BOG such a mess 3 hours is perfect time for an Intl flight (emigration, security checkpoints, etc). During my lunch hour, I got a call from an Avainca representative, advicing me that the flight was delayed for 2 hours, which I appreciatted (later I would regret it), baecause I had a couple of hours to finish some stuff at work. I asked for the reason of the delay and a mx problem was mentioned, so I strarted to suspect that the 757 scheduled was going to be AOG. When I speak to any airline rep, I always ask them how's the flight load, which I was told to be "light", yeah right!!!! We got to the airport at 6.15 pm, to find out an empty queue line in the AV counter, but an airport going some renovations outside the main terminal, which made the entrance a bit caothic. After a quick line of no more than 5 pax, we were received by a friendly representative, which said the flight was FULL and some volunteers would come handy for them!!! Since we were experiencing some delays anyway in our original schedelud, we decided to offer us as volunteers and take the next morning 10am flight, but as I suspected earlier, aircraft was changed to a 767, which left us pretty much sure the extra capacity was enough for the load programmed for the 757.

After chek-in we decided to head inmediately to the gate, and pass trough all the securoty checks, which would allow me to do some spotting and take some pics. When we reached the first Xray machine, I realized that I left the camera at home, what an idiot!!!!!!!! I was looking forward to take some pics of IBs A346, what a dissapointment. After getting to our boarding room, I laid back and started surfing the web looking for some info on our lane for the plane. It came out to be "Colombia Es pasion" (Colombia is passion) special livery, which was a former AM bird, and the latest 767 in AVs fleet, IIRC.

When boarding started, it was obvious the airline didn't needed our seats in this flight, and we proceeded to take 31K and 31J, last seat in the plane, and to be honest, very crappy seats, with the aft galleys right in your back and not the place to have some rest. When I sat down I found that the back of my seat was broken, but I had to wait for an empty space to come up. 10 minutes later only 3 seat were available in Y and none in J, which made me thought I was going to have a sh!!tty flight in that sh!!tty seat, which even AV maintenance tried to fix, but it was completely broken. A FA kindly managed to get us in row 26, aisle and window, and she did this by moving a pax to one of the few empty seats. That was certainly a nice move by the FA and the nice pax who agreed to that, and I end up having the window, perfect for take-off.

Push-back began at 8.30 and a few minutes we were rolling down 13L to a fast climb all the way to 38.000, our cruising altitude for the nite.

Just after take-off some IDIOT, turned his cell phone on and STARTED to make a call. I couldn't believe it, I almost grabbed that guy by his throat, but a FA jumped on him and confiscated the phone, and afterwards gave him a lecture on aviation safety and to pay attention to all recommendations bythe crew. I still can't believe, someone who is travelling with hi family can do this moronic-idiotic action thinking like if he was on a car. This is when I think planes should have some kind of EJECT proceedures for idiots.

service begun, hot towels were handed out and right after, meal was served. Full hot mael, either, tipical choice of beef or chicken. I choose the latter, which I can remember as being Ok, mainly because I was starving. Afer dinner, I ordered a scoth on the rocks and right when the movie was starting, I fell deeply asleep, which was surprising for my wife, mainly because I NEVER sleep on planes. Probably over Cuba (UCA for those simmers like me) we started our descent to MIA. we flew over the ocean and headed west over Key Biscayne and then did a 90° turn over Doral and headed to smoothly land on rwy 09. Rapidly we were stopping in Gate J17 and deplening started into new terminal J, which I was a bit eager to see. Very nice terminal if you ask me, but why in heaven inmigration is always a nightmare?? Only 8 agents to process not only our flight, but also a MX, TA and Lan Peru (IIRC). It took us more than 90 minutes to get clear thru the lines and get the the luggage area, so we could head over to take the Budget shuttle. Finally, around 2.30 am, we got to my uncle's apartment in Key Biscayne: Let the shopping begin!!!!

January 23/2008
BOG-MIA
AV 007
Scheduled departure: 4:15 PM
Actual departure: 4.00 PM
Actual flight Time: 3.15 hrs
Load: 100% J
90% Y

Aircraft:


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Photo © Biel Gomila


After spending some days "attacking" the malls, and after a couple of hundred of $$$ less and a very severely damaged credit card, it was time to head back to Bogota and to the office, to try to make some money and get those bills paid   . My wife drop me off at terminal J (She stayed a few more days im MIA in some things she needed for her job) at 1.15. My original plans had me taken AV 039 to CLO in J (in a 757) and then a MD83 AV 9224 to BOG. This would have given me the chance to fly in all AV tpes in less than three weeks, since I had flown in a F100 in BOG-AXM and a F50on the return a few days back. But since I was a bit tired and really wanted to see my daughter ASAP, I decided to give it a shot in AV007, non-stop to BOG. Lines were fast, the outbound flight to MED was almost closing and I only had 4 persons in front of me. When I got to the checkin desk, the agent rapidly asked me if I wanted to take the BOG flight, but I had to decline my privileges in J and go in the back, since J was full. Still amazes me, but I said yes, but I needed a windos seat. I was given the same one on my previous flight with no neighboor, which really pleased me. It was printed in my boarding pass my boarding time: 4:45, due to weather delays, because some heavy rain in MIA, no harm to me really, I would have more time to walk around terminal J. On the down side, I made the mistake of not asking for a pass to the Business Lounge, mistake I would regret while I was inside the terminal. One thing that really made me curious, is that AV counters are between AC and US, both *A members, maybe a sign of something here?? Who knows....

After check-in, I decided not to avoid the inevitable, and headed to the nightmare of TSA checkpoints. I hate those lines, so long, so slow, so crowded and really intimidating. After the security check, I remembered that I hadn't anything to eat in the whole day, but as I would see later on, not many food concessions on the new terminal. I had to walk all the way to H and get a cheeseburguer in a joint I can't remember (Maybe Hannigans or something like that...). It was very tasty, but there's no tables or seats to eat, I had to go to a normal gate and have my lunch, not very comfortable if you ask me, but the highlight of the lunch was when a DL 757 pulled right in front of me, better than dinner with any city view if you ask me.

At 3.15 I decided to head back to my Gate J17, and boarding was starting!!! What a nice surprise to me, my plane for this flight was N984AN, my Leved-D 767-300ER livery, the plane i "fly" at home. Since I was back in row 26, I entered the plane really fast and got seated ready to take-off. Pushback started al 4.00 and taxiing took us to 08R, where the DL 757 who acompannied me in lunch, was having its takeoff roll, nice view indeed. After we were cleared to enter the active, the pilot push the throttles and in less than 40 secs we were airborne, and starting our turn south over Miami Beach. Once again, the FA's started meal service and I was offered beef or Ricotta and spinach ravioli. I ordered the latter, but honestly, it wasn't that good. I left the plate half full and decided to have my usual scoth on the rocks and once again, snooze off for some time. At one point, right after crossing Jamaica, I woke up, pulled up the shades and saw this extremly beautiful sunset, which I took with my cell phone (Pls don't flame me, I always desactivate all mobile capabilities on my phone, so it mainly becomes a PDA, like a Palm).



Arfter crossing the Colombian northern coast, crew asked for a doctor in the plane. It seemed a pax in J had some heart problems, but he was Ok pretty soon. Fast enough, we started our descent and approach was done what it seemed like a hurry, we landed in 13R and headed to Gate C5. Inmigration in BOG was surprisingly fast, and before I knew, I was on my way home.


Once again, AV proved with their warnm service why I'm a happy, loyal customer, that will keep flying them when I can. Their service is far from being robotic and you can feel they go the extra mile to please you, which makes the diffrence with other airlines like AA, CM, AR, P5 and MX, which I've flown in the near past. I'm just eager to have the new planes in town to have the chance to check AV's only weak side in todays fleet, compared to the big classy guys: lack of PTV's. I hope their new IFE really puts them in the map for a alliance, since their service, on time performance and security record is great.


Hope you like this report, sorry for my english and wait for BOG-PTY-BOG in April (Promise pics for that one), hopefully in their new A320, which fellow a.netter RICARIZA provided us of pics in this thread:

First A-320 In Avianca Colours! (by RICARIZA Jan 29 2008 in Civil Aviation)#menu26

Cheers

777JAAH