Hiking the W Route was def a highlight of our trip and we are a little indecisive on whether or not it beat out kilimanjaro as the absolute highlight. We were very worried about the weather as everyone has heard horror stories about the weather in Patagonia. We had heard about people having to turn back after day 2 because it was too wet, windy and cold to continue on but we had amazing luck. The weather was pretty much perfect with the worst day on day 2 where it rained for about 30 minutes. We decided to go for the [View Full Entry]

---

---

We were really indecisive about whether or not to take the navimag boat as we heard lots of mixed reviews about it. Basically, the boat is a cargo boat which travels from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natalies in the very south of Chile (the gateway to Patagonia). Apparantly the weather can be awful and you can spend the entire trip in your small cabin reading. For $600 each we were not sure if it would be worth it. But, in the end we decided to go for it and if the weather was awful it would at least be a relaxing [View Full Entry]

---

---

Chile keeps on getting better and better. We are really glad that we have planned nearly a whole month here. It is a fantastic country especially if you like the outdoors. The Lakes district is about 12 or so hours south of Santiago. We took another overnight bus to get here and again slept pretty well. The buses here are really good and we have not even tried the Premium seats yet as they are always sold out. Pucon was fantastic not only because of the nice scenery, but because we had 4 nights here--the longest we have been in one [View Full Entry]

---

---

Santiago is fantastic. There are huge supermarkets where you can buy pretty much anything you could want (fruit, meat, brown bread and cold milk), very good public transportation, the drivers are super polite and let pedestrians go ahead of them and because we are at a lower elevation it is possible to go for a run and go to the gym!!! It is def a place we could live if we were ever going to live in S. America. Walking around, you feel as though you could be in any European city. We didn´t originally plan to come here but as [View Full Entry]

---

---

I know we keep saying it but the Salt Plains in Bolivia were another highlight of our trip. It was absolutely fantastic and we got a load of amazing pics. I won´t write too much as the pictures can describe the sites much better than I can--but as always the pictures dont do the place justice, it was just amazing. The journey started off with an overnight bus journey which took about 13 hours. The bus was actually pretty nice with good reclining seats, unfortunately after midnight we were on very bumpy unpaved roads so it was not that easy to [View Full Entry]

---

---

The Atacama was another amazing place to visit. Just as with the Salt Plains the pictures can describe it better than I can but they dont do the place justice. It was amazing. Getting there was interesting. We had heard that there were strikes going on in Chili and that those that worked at the border crossing might not show up and we may be stuck in the desert in Bolivia until they came into work. Not a perfect situation but we are a little ahead of schedule so we would have been ok. As it turns out, it was not [View Full Entry]

---

---

This trip was another highlight of the trip. Well, the trip to the Pampas was a def highlight, our jungle trip turned out to be less than fantastic! Getting to Rurrenabaque (main town) involved a very terrifying 45 minute flight on a tiny plane with lots of turbulence. The scariest part was landing on the little dirt track! We were both happy to be on land even if it was very very hot once we arrived at our desitination. For our trip we were booked two separate excursions, a 2 night Pampas tour and then a one night jungle trip. The [View Full Entry]

---

---

We were a little worried that we would not be able to make it to Lake Titicaca as there were huge farmer strikes going on in Peru and they had shut down the highway we needed to pass. We asked quite a few travel agents and were convinced by one that it was now safe to travel on the highway so booked a bus. When we showed up at bus station the next morning we learned that our bus had been cancelled due to the strikes. So much for that travel agent!!! After looking around a bit we managed to find [View Full Entry]

---

---

We had originally thought that cusco would just be a place to take it easy and get used to the higher altitude before we did the Inca Trail. It was actually a really great city to visit though. The town is set in between mountains and is very beautiful. The city has cobblestone streets and small alleys which make it fun to walk around. Because of the high altitude (i think it is about 3,400meters) I did have a headache for the first couple of days but nothing too bad. It was also a bit of a party town although we [View Full Entry]

---

---

The Galapagos Islands are absolutely one of the highlights of our trip. We had a fantastic time and I can´t think think of a better way to celebrate my birthday (even though they are starting to get depressing!). Because of our flight dramas getting to South America we missed the first day of our trip and had to pay US$500 to take a speedboat to catch up to our boat. We only missed one day though so it was not the end of the world, however we did miss the island that has the huge land Tortoises which was disappointing. Everyday [View Full Entry]

---

---