I arrived back in Quito after a week in the Galápagos Islands. I had already booked a tour in Cuba beginning about a week later but I hadn't booked a flight - I had been busy and figured I could sort it out when I got back to Quito. However, while I was away, Cuba had suspended all flights from Mexico due to the flu pandemic that originated in Mexico. Pretty much all flights to Cuba go via Mexico so this presented a big problem...

Cuba's national carrier, Cubana, was the best option for getting into the country from other destinations in Latin America but they only ran one or two flights a week from selected cities and none from Quito. Unhelpfully, Cubana's website had stopped working, nobody answered their phone lines, I couldn't get through to their agents in the UK and (after wasting many hours and much money on taxis) I couldn't find the supposed offices of their agents in Quito.

Eventually I had an email response from them telling me that I could get a ticket to fly from Bogotá in Colombia if I went to their office in Bogotá so I had to book a flight to Bogotá and just hope that it would all work out!