Long Day of Traveling -- Jan 1-2

Finally, the day has arrived.  My flight leaves out of Seattle close to 2 in the afternoon and for international flights you should be there 3 hours ahead of that and it takes an hour on the light rail from Lynnwood to the airport and another 20 minutes' drive from hour house to the light rail station....  So, we left about 9:30 in the morning.

It was gray and overcast, not exciting weather but typical for the time of year.  I practically had the rail car to myself.  After a stop or two a guy got on with the big puffy jacket and a half bottle of beer.  Who knows if he was just enjoying himself or if he had gotten off work and was drowning his sorrows.  Anyway, got to the airport without issue and started to the terminal with 800 pounds of moto gear and a half pair of underwear.  Hahaha

Checking in was interesting.  You need to show the folks checking you on your flight that you have a RETURN FLIGHT.  Apparently, Colombia does not want us to just come and not leave, imagine that!  Of course, I have a 1-way ticket because I don't have the foggiest idea when I'll be coming home if ever, so I had to go sit down, break out the phone and book a flight home.  I picked about 60 days out, FULLY REFUNDABLE economy flight to Huston was $1299 cough, cough, gag!  Sheesh!  And that was sitting on the wing.  It took me a while to figure out how to book the flight, but I managed and headed over to check in AGAIN.  They were able to get me through the system with the return flight, I said goodbye to my bags and headed through security.  

For this trip I decided to get a Global Entry card so I could zip through on the way back.  It also allows me to go through the TSA precheck.  Now every time I go through this silly screening I get pulled aside for special treatment. Eyeroll....  Today was no different.  

I got on the plane and was fortunate to sit where I could see the guy loading the luggage.  I did catch my 2 pieces being loaded on, so I knew they would make it to at least Denver my next stop. 

The flight was not bad, couldn't see anything but talked to a Rich Chinese Lawyer that lives in Seattle, and we ended up talking about cars most of the flight and traveling to different countries.  He was headed to Munich to go skiing with his daughter.  A quick layover in Denver and on to Huston.  Another semi quick layover and it's off to Medellin, Colombia.

I was supposed to arrive about 5:42 AM but we got in about 5:15 AM.  Then figure an hour through customs and getting bags and be out 7.  I'm figuring the 5-hour line, being interrogated in a dark room with a lightbulb in my face.  I read on the website that I needed to show my passport, where I'm staying, return flight, blah, blah, blah.  In about 10 min I'm at the guy checking my paperwork and he only wanted to see my passport.  No questions, Stamped it and basically said get outta here.  I walked into the next room and this guy is unloading all the luggage into a nice line.  My stuff was there so I grabbed them and headed into the next room and line.  We had to run our bags through a scanner and our jackets and 2 min. later I was a Citizen of Colombia (well close enough).

The terminal is kind of small and maybe they are working on it.  Taxis are all over the place and very tiny Fiats mostly, some Hyundai and a few small Toyotas.  I was staying at a woman's house from Homestay.com and did NOT want to get there at the crack of dawn to wake the house up so I just hung out in the terminal until about 7, people watching, dog watching (they take them everywhere).  Finally, the sun came up and I was going to get an Uber but then it was more than a taxi so taxi it is.

The international airport is on the other side of the mountains from the actual city of Medellin.  We took off towards the city and very shortly hit a toll booth.  About 200 yards later we start into a HUGE tunnel.  This tunnel went on forever and the driver told me it was about 9.4 KM long so about a 6-mile tunnel.  Motorcycles are not allowed on this road so that was interesting.

The clouds were just like Seattle and down low with spitting rain.  In spite of it I could see the city of 4 million people and there were skyscrapers everywhere.  Houses were up the steep hillsides, and it is STEEP around there with mountains all over the place.

It is surrounded by hills.  When we finally got into town it was pouring, motorcycles were like killer bees zooming all over the place.  There is no lane for them, and lines are merely a suggestion as they split lanes and drive like maniacs.   We crossed over the main river going through town and I could see lights EVERYWHERE!  I could tell there was an incredible light show from Christmas that I needed to see one night so I took a mental note.

Finally, I arrived at my destination and was met by the nice woman renting out the room and then I crashed on the bed for quite a while.