Day 1: Bolivia or Bust

Bolivia? Yup, Bolivia.
Our trip started off well yesterday - no trouble in Austin, Dallas or Miami with the flights or connections. We settled in our fancy first class seats and headed south. Until about 3am in some other time zone that is. ..
I wasn't sleeping well - I know, I know. Leave it to Jan to not even be able to sleep in the fancy seats but whatever, my back was hurting and there was no sleeping to be had. (Unlike my sweet husband who was so totally gone that I could hear him snoring even across the divider and over the roar of the 777 engine.)
Anyway, so I began to notice more activity than usual up front. We had about 2 hrs until landing so I figured they were getting breakfast ready and all that jazz. Nope. Apparently some poor guy in the back was having or about to have a heart attack and they were trying to decide what to do. The pilot came on and said we were turning around and flying 45 minutes north to Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Now, if I was having a medical emergency a middle-of-nowhere town in Bolivia would not be my first choice. But, I guess the 45 min trip back vs. two hours to Buenos Aires seemed the best choice. Ironically, there were two doctors on board and one was this guy's daughter. Our flight attendant joked that the guy was thinking that paying her medical school tuition was probably a good decision right about then.
Bolivia was pretty desolate. Basically, we saw dirt roads and a landing strip. They opened the door and a bunch of firefighters and medics ran on the plane all wearing face masks. Pretty entertaining! We were on the ground for about an hour or so. Then we headed on to BA. We arrived about three hours late but safe and sound.
We showered and went out for lunch. We ended up eating with the two women in line in front of us at the restaurant. They were here just for a day and about to fly further south to take a cruise of Antarctica. How fun is that!
Oh, and an FYI to anyone thinking of coming to Argentina. They are now charging a $133 pp Visa fee upon arrival. Surprise!
And for the record my husband’s favorite part of Day 1 was flying over Cuba. He got a kick out of that.
We took a nap and are getting ready to go have pizza for dinner. So, in summary, we're here, first class is pretty sweet, Bolivia is boring and I'm sunburned.

Pictures here.

Love to all,
Jan