Post #372599 by bamalamalu on Tue, Apr 8, 2008 10:27 PM

I got my tickets today! Wooooo!

I'll be going in early October. I'm also booking everything separately; it took a while to figure out the best dates to get the best flight schedule, but I finally got it set. Booked directly with Lan on the US website. I'm already pretty much out of patience with them; the site acted up on me a bit during all my researching, and then the credit card payment didn't go through when I tried to purchase my flights. I searched around online and it sounds like that's fairly common. It will book the flights and give a reservation code, but the online payments don't always go through. You need to have the CC holder call and verify all the info before the tickets will actually be issued. They say they'll call you to do that, but...it'll be a lot quicker if you call them yourself (after 2 days we got tired of waiting.) On the plus side, it sounded like we wouldn't be able to get seat assignments until 48 hours prior to each flight, but I was able to go in online and choose & confirm seats once my reservation was held (even before it was actually ticketed). Hopefully they won't disappear (I'll be checking obsessively for the next 6 months.)

I will also have 6 full days on Easter Island and am really excited. I was hoping to add on another destination since I'm going all that way, but there just isn't enough Vacation time from work. I decided I'd rather have more time actually on Easter Island rather than have to cut that short and try to squeeze something else in. We're just doing a quick one-night stopover in Santiago on the way down, and then a full day there on the way back. I'm hoping that with the stopovers built in, there won't be as much of a chance for problems making flight connections if (when!) there are delays. Now I need to research Santiago hotels & sights more. And practice my Espanol - and Rapanui!