Above: On board the Viva Air A320, the seats were plastic shells with padding!
After a day of relaxation and planning for future travel, we left our lovely mini-resort for Santa Marta airport around 1130. The ride took about 90 mins, getting to the small beach-side airport (with views) around 1300.
We managed to bagdrop with Viva Air immediately for our 1630 flight and went airside to the lounge where the internet was awesome.
I wanted to put my plans into action by booking flights from Abu Dhabi to Baku and then onwards to Budapest. Luck wasn’t on my side with my New Zealand SIM card not connecting to the network in order to receive SMS for payment authorization. When I got over this hurdle, the Wizz Air website seemingly didn’t want to accept my payment.
On board the Viva Air A320, the seats were plastic shells with padding! It was fixed with some recline and was comfortable enough for the short flight. With narrow seats, the aisle was probably wide enough for two trolleys.
The budget airline impressed with our luggage waiting at the belt upon arrival. The airport, according to Google is about 600m above the city, on a plateau. The 45 min Uber ride through traffic, made the descent partially through an 8km tunnel. We arrived at Hotel 574, a small boutique place in the leafy high-class area of Poblado around 1900.
We had a light lunch of two small meals at the lounge, so we went out for dinner nearly immediately. The burgers nearby were the best I’ve had for a long time. Walking to/from the diner, we felt the temperature was perfect. It was a tiny bit cooler at the airport much higher up.
After dinner, I had success making my flight bookings, which cleared some clouds off my mind. One of the flights ended up being EUR40 cheap, which is a great payback for the stress and hassle in the afternoon.