The clocks showed two thirty in the morning when I called the Uber that would take me to Guarulhos. The Avianca flight to Lima, Peru, requires passengers to be early risers: we would leave at 5:55 in the morning. On the other hand, the advantage is arriving in the Peruvian capital early, at 9 am, after a 5:10 flight and in a position to enjoy the day (and the cuisine) of the city.
The Colombian company Avianca, which in 2009 merged with the Caribbean TACA and a few years ago also started operating in Brazil, taking the place and name of the former OceanAir, has become the second largest airline in Latin America. Only LATAM, the merger of Chilean LAN and Brazilian TAM, is larger. In recent years, Avianca has become an option for flying to the United States, the Caribbean and other parts of South America from Brazil.
See too: Peru, far beyond Machu Picchu
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The Avianca flight to Lima from Guarulhos is daily – the return flight from Peru to Brazil always leaves at 10pm, Lima time, and arrives on green and yellow soil at 4:55am, Brazilian time. Clocks in Peru show two hours less than the official Brasília time. In addition, the company also operates direct flights to Lima from Porto Alegre (daily, always at 6:25 am and returning at 10:30 pm) and from Rio de Janeiro (daily, leaving at 5:35 am and returning at 9:30 pm). In addition to Avianca, LATAM flies to the Peruvian capital.
How was my flight experience?
We flew on an Airbus A321, with 194 seats, 12 of them in business class, which occupies three rows at the front of the aircraft, two seats at a time, and the rest in economy class, where I traveled and which has seats distributed in rows of three. I was unlucky on the way there: I went in the middle. Despite this, I didn’t find it uncomfortable and there was some legroom.
The negative point, on the other hand, was the lack of individual in-flight entertainment. It’s okay that the flight was early in the morning, it’s okay that no one had slept properly and it took me a few minutes to switch off, but even so, it was missed. And remember that the flight is not the shortest – it takes more than five hours!
The food was up to the standard of flights of the same type I’ve taken in South America. It was simple, but not compromising. I ordered pasta on the outbound flight, ate the bread and even the fruit, but I still had some left over.
Important tip, but one that I missed, even because it wasn’t in the window: just over an hour before landing in Lima, the plane begins to fly over the Andes. If you have the opportunity, grab the camera, open your eyes wide and enjoy the view, which, say those who have seen it, is a spectacle. As the return flight is at night, you can’t see anything on it.
We left Guarulhos on time and arrived in Lima on time. Speaking of the Peruvian city, praise should be given to Jorge Chávez Airport, which has been nominated a few times as the best in South America, by Skytrax Research.
The return flight, a week later, was also on an A321. But with one difference: this time we had an individual entertainment system, which was great, since we boarded early, at 9:30 pm, and I still wasn’t sleepy. Once inside the plane, sitting in the aisle (phew!) there was a delay of almost an hour, during which time the pilot and technicians were in the cabin trying to solve a problem.
Everything resolved, we took off. In addition to the in-flight entertainment, I also liked the food more on the return flight, which remained simple, but was more interesting. We arrived in Guarulhos late, but well.
I did some price research and discovered that a direct flight to Lima costs between R$900 and R$1100, plus taxes. This, of course, is an estimate – you may find cheaper rates or even pay much more than that, depending on the time of year. Contrary to what I expected, flights from Porto Alegre are even a little cheaper – and shorter – than those departing from the southeast.
*360meridianos traveled to Peru at the invitation of Submarino Viagens and PromPerú.