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Sunday December 19, 1999 - Last night my buddy Bob met me at Cancun Airport and we took the cheap peso bus to our hotel. We got up the next morning with loads of time to spare. Since last year the line for Cubana Airlines flight to Cancun did not even form to 11 AM, we thought we could get away with arriving at 10:15 AM instead of 10 AM. Little did we know that our entire group checked in by 10 AM, they actually arrived at 9:30 AM. Because the line was so long it was not until a quarter of 11 that I made contact with David Mozer the Bicycle Cuba Director in the US from Seattle. He gave us our tickets and wished us luck getting on. This was the best he could do. Our group was split now with me and Bob behind. The plane left without us and 20 other overbooked passengers. One lady blew her top at the travel agents. I politely asked a few minutes later if there was any possiblility of flying today. They said ALL the airlines were sold out. I envisioned us taking 3 days to get to Habana. But not to fear the Cubana Airlines gave us a special flight at 10 PM, that arrived with 3 incredibly drunk passengers aboard who would have been arrested, and not allowed on the plane in any other country. But this is laid back Cuba. We arrived safely at 12:30 AM and I thank God for it. I was afraid one of those drunks would smash out the windows and the whole plane would explode. One of them went 3 times into the pilots cabin. They refused to buckle seat belts or even sit in their chairs. When some Cuban Air Marshals came on the plane and yelled at them they got in line very quickly. I guess they were afraid of the Cuban jails. When we arrived at 12:30 AM Monday morning, I had all my stuff, but 6 of us had various missing pieces of luggage including Bob's bike. Dave Mozer lost his bike on the earlier flight. I hope we get our bikes back tomorrow. It turned out Bob got his the next day, but David's still has not shown up. I crawled in bed at 4 AM. Pedro (Cuban trip leader) and David met us at the airport, bless their souls. I ate dinner at 3 AM. Bob went straight to bed without dinner.
