Lima’s new Jorge Chávez International Airport (LIM) terminal officially opened on June 1, 2025, about four weeks before we arrived in Lima on the evening of the 28th. The new terminal is a significant upgrade, tripling the size of the old terminal and designed to handle 40 million passengers annually by 2030. While it was exciting to be in the terminal when it was so new, as Chris noted he doesn’t think we’ve ever been in an airport terminal this new, we were not quite expecting the little adventure that was to come when going through immigration and passport control.

When we landed, the first hiccup we encountered was when the jet bridge took over half an hour to actually roll out properly and allow us to get off the plane. We were all mostly sitting there, twiddling our fingers, wondering when we’d be allowed out of the plane and into Peru. Then when we arrived at passport control, a peculiar thing happened: all of the systems went down. Every computer screen we could see looked blank. No passenger who was at a passport control desk was leaving. None of the lines were moving. But they were all getting longer, and longer, and longer. Agents were tapping their keyboards over and over. Nothing was happening. While passport control and immigration areas typically have big signs everywhere saying “No mobile phone usage,” a few agents actually stood up on their tables or chairs to take videos or wide panorama shots of all the hoards and hoards of people like us, standing there waiting to clear immigration but with no clearing in sight. We waited for over an hour, and then finally, as though someone in charge actually realized how inefficient and embarrassing all this was (and how it would likely hold up other arriving planes and result in total pandemonium), we were handed little paper forms to manually fill out. Needless to say, this was a total cluster. It felt like a miracle when we finally got through. And while it was infuriating to wait, I chocked it all up to being part of the “travel experience,” a true “Welcome to Peru!” message. I smiled at the thought of it; we’re just running on Latin American time!