And so, The Goddess of Food & Love and her willing acolyte are on their way. As I type this, we're on our second Copa flight in two days, three hours away from SXM and champing at the bit to get there and let that old familiar sand gravity take hold. Our trip so far had us overnighting in Panama. We fly on points so we're used to layovers and usually we end up on US Dare going through Charlotte. Panama City is a lot different!

Flying with Copa Airlines was another first and it was like stepping back in time to the days when airlines fed and watered their passengers free of charge and didn't spend the entire flight trying to sell credit cards and duty-free. The cabin staff poured rum straight from the bottle and didn't skimp on the measures, so the 5 hour flight passed very pleasantly as we snoozed and read our way down to Central America -- another first.

Sleep was very much on our minds. In the middle of a mind-numbing Ontario heat wave, our AC at home decided to fail the day before our trip. With a 5AM start, we tried to get an early night but sleep was just about impossible and it was a pretty grouchy pair that headed for the airport, let me tell you. Once we got to our hotel, any ideas of sightseeing went right out the window as soon as we hit our icebox-cold hotel room. All we saw of Panama was our bed and the next door mall when we finally woke up that evening and decided that we should maybe get something to eat. That meant that I didn't have to assault too many pairs of ears with my atrocious attempts at Spanish.

Our flight to SXM left more or less on time and after 30 minutes or so, coffee & OJ arrived accompanied by a hot cooked breakfast. Are you listening, US Dare? No rum this time but 8:30 in the morning is too early for rum, even for me. Now, the thing about being in the middle seat is that you are forced to eat with your elbows tucked in to your sides. It's kind of like being a praying mantis. And now, I think it's time for a snooze...

And then we were on the ground and Iain was switching tenses. It was interesting watching the process at Immigrations and Customs when dealing with a not-solely-tourist flight. In fact, I think there were very few tourists other than ourselves on that flight. We could see the Immigrations inspector questioning each person ahead of us in the line and looking pretty serious. When our turn came, she was all sweetness when she realized we were tourists and not looking to stay. The customs section, which is normally deserted when we arrive on our US Dare flights, was well-manned and we were interviewed briefly about how long we were staying. Interesting...

And then we were through and Di-Di was waiting for us outside arrivals and took us to AAA and processed us in record time and then were off in a little Kia, going clockwise around the island until we got here to Club Fantastico where Chloe was waiting to greet us. And now we relax.