What to expect if flying from the Chilean capital.
Dropping off rental cars at Santiago Airport?
It’s hard not to groan when dropping off the rental car. I can’t just walk to the terminal – I have to take the free shuttle bus. This is all very reasonable – encourage people to take public transport, yadda yadda – but it’s usually a surefire sign that an airport’s going to involve more hassle than is strictly ideal.
People have different ideas of what makes a good airport. Some want lots of facilities, shops and restaurants – they want going to the airport to be an experience and provide stimulus. Others are more pragmatic about it, and just want to get on the plane with as little stress as possible. Big airports are generally a better bet for the former (although some of them are simply awful), and small airports are better for the latter.
How big is Santiago Airport?
Santiago’s international airport – officially called Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport and often known as Nuevo Pudahuel – fits in a weird halfway house. It’s not one of those tiny airports that’s essentially one large room with a vending machine. It’s big for South America, and a key hub for cross-Pacific connections, but clearly not in the same ballpark as Heathrow, New York JFK, Dubai or Singapore Changi.
It’s either faffy buses or a 15km taxi journey from the centre, and further from the areas where most hotels cluster.
Check-in at Santiago Airport
Check-in is mildly shambolic because the desks only open three hours before the flight departs, and the signage above the desks shows the wrong airline for a while.
Otherwise, it’s all relatively smooth. Security and passport control are relatively smooth because they have enough staff on, touchscreen maps show where everything is in the terminal and there’s plenty of seating by the gates. It’s clean, it looks relatively slick and modern and yet it feels like it could be punching in a division higher than it is.
Shopping at Santiago Airport
The shopping is pretty good – duty free’s sizable, and there are a few international designer stores – but the stores selling local chocolates, alpaca wool shawls and copper trinketry fall into the trap of being a little samey. At least they exist, though.
Food and drink, again, has plenty of options – there’s a semi-circular food court with standard burger, pizza and sandwich fare, plus the Ruby Tuesday American restaurant, a couple of coffee shop/ café hybrids and a wine bar selling local wines. This is the closest it gets to groundbreaking or genuinely exciting, though.
Review of Santiago Airport: In summary
And this is Santiago Airport to a tee. There’s nothing especially hateful about it – it’s several billion times better than, say, LAX or Miami. But everything’s not quite as good as it could be, whether the bar that only sells Heineken or the slightly too long walk to the C gates where British Airways flies from. If it was a Premier League football team, Arturo Merino Benítez International would be Everton.
More Santiago travel
Other Santiago travel stories on Planet Whitley include:
- A review of the Vinolia wine-tasting experience.
- Driving into the Andes from Santiago.
For other Santiago activities and experiences, select from the options here.
