Before leaving the Galapagos we´d decided to blow the budget and fly to Rio for the last 3 days of Carnival, it was pretty expensive but we just couldn´t resist going.

We booked the flights on line and the plan was to fly from the Galapagos to Ecuador on 14th February and then that evening fly out to Rio. Unfortunately the night before we were due to leave we got an email saying there was a problem with the flights and we had to ring to confirm some details. This is easier said than done in the Galapagos as there are no public phones on the street and all the telephone places were closed for the night.

To cut a long story short they ended up cancelling our flights (which we found out after several hours of queuing and a ridiculously expensive phone call). We then re queued to see if we could book them again, so when we managed this you can imagine how happy we were, we had about an hour to kill before check in so we celebrated with a KFC!

The queue at check in was horendous and people kept pushing in and being brought to the font etc so we ended up beng the last people to check in for the flight and when we got there we were told they had overbooked the plane and would we help them out and stay overnight in Guyaquil at their expense. My response to this was a categoric no and to get upset, we were both really tired, we´d hung about all day for this flight and we´d paid a small fotune for it so this was the last thing we wanted to hear. Ultimately though we didn´t have a choice, it´s not as if they can put us on the roof rack! We both blame the KFC because if we hadn´t gone for that we would have been at the front of the queue AND it was rubbish so not een worth it, the colonel would not be happy with the pocessed chicken burger we were served!

We (along with 3 other people) were then taken to the swankiest Hilton hotel we have ever been in, let me tell you, the 2 of us with our backpacks and flip flops well and truly stuck out like a sore thumb. We were given a meal voucher for an evening meal but neither of us were hungry so I asked (in true Brits abroad style) if we could spend it on beer instead of food but sadly this wasn´t allowed.

The room was absolutely huge, 2 TV´s, a massive comfy bed and as a brucy bonus there was a bath! At this point we started to think that maybe the overbooking wasn´t too bad after all.

We went to the bar for our free welcome drink and then decided we´d be stupid to turn down a free feed so we went to the restaurant. It was an all you can eat buffet for $38 but we only had a $15 allowance each, the deal was we were allowed to go up once rather than all you can eat, there was no indication as to how much you could get on one plate so obviously we went for it. I have never seen as much meat on Casson´s plate as what he got that night! Whilst we were eating Casson had spotted some chocolate desserts which he really wanted but we weren´t allowed, clearly this didn´t stop me getting him them. Sometimes it pays not to speak Spanish as you can play dumb when you´re doing something you know you shouldn´t be :-)

Once we were back in the room we got a knock on the door and it was room service, I told him we hadn´t ordered anything to which he replied it was free, my response "free? well in that case in you come, we´ll have it"

The nex day we had the biggest cooked breakfast (also a buffet) and then managed to squeeze lunch in as well, we hadn´t ate so much or so well in ages so we definitely made the most of it!

Next stop Rio .................