SA Route

WilcoOut

Iv been pestering you all for quite some time!

so heres the fruit of our labours ( so far!)

Rio

Ilha Grande

Soa Paulo

Iguaza Falls

Asuncion

Corrientes

Salta

Tupiza

Urunyi

Potosi

Oruro

La Paz

Puno (lake titicaca)

Cusco!

any comments or observations

adice, criticisms

we will then have to head south to BA via santiago

Handy11

You're going to have a class adventure. Great route. I would recommend avoiding Asuncion. It's bollocks really. We did it and the Jesuit ruins in Paraguay and it was time wasted really.

Don't book Salar tour in advance. You'll get one in Uyuni on the spot for cheaper. Don't stay there overnight (nothing there really). 12 hour overnight bus to La Paz is an experience. Mental.

Also, Potisi is only worth visiting if you want to see the mines. It's all a bit exploitative. With Bolivia I'd bypass Oruro and go straight to La Paz. There's so much to do from there and if you go to Loki hostel you'll end up staying longer than you expected. We went to La Paz for 5 days and ended up leaving over 2 weeks later having climbed Huayna Potosi, cycled the death road and gotten a large tattoo at an expo! Loved it.

I'd highly recommend LlamaPath as the inca Trail company. They treated the porters far better than most of the others. Food was very good too.


I know it seems like im just knocking places, but the rest are so class theres no need to comment. You will have a blast. PM me if you're interested and I'll give you lots more info on lots of the places you mentioned. I have a great memory for names of hostels, bars, streets etc. and would be happy to share

Gone_Dutch

Trip sounds great, would love to be going back there!

+1 for Potosi- the mines aren't for everyone and just walking around the town is a b***h with the altitude.

If you're doing the salt flats tour go Tupiza to Uyuni - looks like this is your plan? A bit more expensive but worth it.

Other possible places I really enjoyed were Paraty in in Brazil - go from Ilha Grande, and get a bus straight to Sao Paulo.

If you have some extra time I would definitely recommend Rurrenenaque in Bolivia. One of the easiest places to get to the jungle, and you will see so many more animals than in other areas- anacondas, crocs, piranhas, pink dolphins, sloths, monkeys, etc just in few days. If you do death road stay down the bottom and bus there.. not for the faint hearted though, so worth considering returning to La Paz and flying. Head back to La Paz then and onto Puno.

AIDO Tours

Gone_Dutch wrote: »

If you have some extra time I would definitely recommend Rurrenenaque in Bolivia. One of the easiest places to get to the jungle, and you will see so many more animals than in other areas- anacondas, crocs, piranhas, pink dolphins, sloths, monkeys, etc just in few days. If you do death road stay down the bottom and bus there.. not for the faint hearted though, so worth considering returning to La Paz and flying. Head back to La Paz then and onto Puno.

Yeah fly one way at least. if you want to see some animals don't do a jungle tour, you won't see any in the trees, opt for a pampas tour instead. It is much more open territory, farmland even, so you can see the monkeys, crocs and birds.

M450

+1 for Paraty, it's a lovely colonial town with some beaches nearby and my favourite thing about it was the waterfalls. Grab some people and get a bus out to the furthest one and walk back towards Paraty to see another 2. Not quite big waterfalls but there's a 10m jump on one, a rock slide and a pretty cool swing on another. Although I'll still stay that the bus from Angra to Paraty was the worst bus I got in SA!! haha. 2 hours of twists and turns on a public/city bus so you couldn't even fall asleep and stay in the seat haha.

I skipped Sao Paulo after so many people telling me it wasn't worth it, especially people I met in Rio that were from Sao Paulo and visiting Rio to get away from it all. Other travelers described it as immense and spread out but did say the nightlife was amazing. I was satisfied having been to Rio and being on my way to BA so I just wanted to get to Iguazu.

I'd recommend Cordoba and in particular Tango Hostel, owned by 2 Colombianos who are great craic. I ended up staying a month in that hostel! I ended up taking some Spanish lessons and got to know a lot of people in the city. It's great because the population is so young, it's a real student city, and has a similar scene to BA but smaller and easier to get around. It was great walking to Spanish school from the hostel and walking to the centre and to nightclubs. Also the colombian guys take everybody out and get you in free and skip the queue.

I did the salt flat tour from Tupiza to Uyuni and it was amazing. I really wanted to cross into Chile from Salta and see San Pedro de Atacama but the pass was closed for like 2 weeks and had no sign of opening back up so I just went to Tupiza. Also between Salta and Tupiza I'd recommend stopping off for a few hours in Purmamarca to see the 7 coloured rock and Tilcara. I was pissed off with how crap Jujuy was so jumped on a bus in the afternoon to Purmamarca and spent the night there which was pretty cool. Then got up at 7 and got a cheap taxi to Tilcara, did a bit of a hike in the western style hills and saw some ruins of a fort, then bussed to Humahuaca, had a look around the city but there wasn't a whole lot to see, then bussed to Villazon and crossed the border and jumped on a bus to Tupiza and got there before midnight.

I spent a night in Potosi but stayed out of the mines because of my asthma, apparently it was a good decision based on what others said. Otherwise there's nothing to see in Potosi but cool to say you've been there. The altitude really takes your breath away!

For Lake Titicaca I stayed on the Bolivian side, in Copacabana. It was a really nice town with a big hill on the lakefront that you can climb and get some cool views. Isla del Sol was amazing, you can walk the length of it on a day trip but while I was there I regretted not staying a night. (I had a bus booked to Arequipa the next morning)

Also I have to say that Arequipa was my favourite Peruvian city. Really clean and some cool buildings, great scenery with El Misti in the background. Good nightlife and you can go on a tour of the Colca Canyon if you wish, I was too busy drinking however... I went from Copacabana, through Puno to Arequipa, then on to Cusco which worked well.

And if you haven't booked a trek to Machu Picchu just wait until you get there and and you'll get one in a day or two. There are so many options but I just went with the standard Jungle trek. We spent 1 day biking downhill and 2 days trekking, then the fourth day we walked up to Machu Picchu and spent the whole day there. It was probably the highlight of my entire trip!

WilcoOut

cheers for all the replies!

in in paraty at the moment, its my last day. going to the water falls in about an hour. alot of the others in the hostel did it yday and were raving about it so im determined not to miss it!

Rio was amazing and alot safer than i expected. we got a great taste of brazilian life when we went to a Flamngo game with 2 brazilians and a vietnamese couple. they came back to win 2-1 in the 90th min and the place went nuts!

we then went to ilha grande and had an amazing time! we would have stayed longer, only we couldnt get cash as theres no ATMs

so here we are, on our last tday in paraty. tmoro we set off for foz de iguaza

so serious time on a bus. any advice on this portion of the trip?

iguaza - asuncion (1day) - corrientes - Salta

cheers guys!

what a place to visit. so beautiful and the people are so friendly

Handy11

WilcoOut wrote: »

cheers for all the replies!

in in paraty at the moment, its my last day. going to the water falls in about an hour. alot of the others in the hostel did it yday and were raving about it so im determined not to miss it!

Rio was amazing and alot safer than i expected. we got a great taste of brazilian life when we went to a Flamngo game with 2 brazilians and a vietnamese couple. they came back to win 2-1 in the 90th min and the place went nuts!

we then went to ilha grande and had an amazing time! we would have stayed longer, only we couldnt get cash as theres no ATMs

so here we are, on our last tday in paraty. tmoro we set off for foz de iguaza

so serious time on a bus. any advice on this portion of the trip?

iguaza - asuncion (1day) - corrientes - Salta

cheers guys!

what a place to visit. so beautiful and the people are so friendly

The bus will be nice and comfy. Around 12-14 hours if I remember right. We did up to 30 hour journeys on our trip and never had any problems. Bring water and snacks.

Get to the argentine side of Iguazu falls. You can go underneath them in a boat (exhilarating) and you get a much more up-close-and-personal visit. Stay at the Hostel Inn on the argentine side. Like a fancy resort hotel. Good nighclub (Cuba Libre) in the local town. Packed with locals, great craic.

In Salta, eat at a restaurant called El Viejo Jack. It has the best steak I ever tried in my life. Ourselves and some friends went there 2 nights in a row (a thing we NEVER did anywhere else on the trip). It's amazing. Just get a bottle of Malbec with it and do NOT order fries/sides. It's worth it - trust me. Get the Picana. It's half way between the filet and the bife the chorizo. Nyom.

Lots of great bars in Salta up Balcarce (near to the Parc 20 de Febrero). Rock bars, reggae bars, nighclubs, karaoke, all kinds of daftness. Great spot at night. There's a wicked hot dog diner on the way up that street. Lots of young people hanging about. Smashing hot dogs.