BootsnAll Travel Community

Hey guys, planning on 4 months in Sth America from November this year. The plan is to start in Bogota and end in Rio for Carnival in Feb. Trying to establish some kind of feasible itinerary. Thinking along the lines of:-

Bogota
bus to Medellin
bus to Cali
bus to Quito
bus to Lima (any suggestions of a stop off in between???)
bus to Cusco (do Inca trail)
bus to La Paz
FLY to Santiago
bus to Mendoza-Cordoba-Santa Fe- Rosario- Buenos Aires
bus to Iguazu
bus to Porto Alegre-Florianopolis-Santos-Rio

Is this realistic in 4 months and have i missed out any 'must see' stops along the way??
Also what sort of budget will i need for these 4 months?

Any input would be muchly appreciated!

Cheers

Start at the end. Do you have a reservation in Rio? If not you may be screwed. Do that today. It won't be cheap. There are no deals. Most places have minimum stays. Budget. Again a bit backwards. I could do that route real comfy on $20,000. How much do you have? Best to see if it is feasible with you finances. You can always cut corners. It's a very rushed trip. You can do it. But in the end you will wish you had an extra month or two.

Itinerary-what are your interests? You are skipping lots of stuff but they may not interest you. Ecuador. Gather the Galapogos are out of budget. Too bad. Other things to see- Otavalo, Vilcabamba. Beaches-wait for Brazil. Peru. Northern Peru can be given a skip as you don't have time. Islas de Paracas. Nazca-many feel they are overrated. Arequipa/Colca Canyon. Cusco-slow season but I'd book the trail a week in advance anyways. If you have lots of money go to Manu, otherwise see the Rurre option. Lake Titicaca-you pass by anyway. Uros islands and Silustani on the Peru side. Cheap and quick. From La Paz you can go to Rurrenbaque for one of the best value jungle/pampas trips. Salar de Uyuni is one of the must sees and is cheap. If all you are seeing in Chile is Santiago I'd give Chile a miss. At this point you have neither time or interests. Not a lot of detail since you didn't give any either.

Thanks for the input!

Wow- $20,000 for 4 months.... surely not. I figured $2000 a month so $8000 would be fine for 4 months? Is this not realistic?

Yeah, $20k might be a slightly high figure for such a route. I could live quite beyond what I'd call "comfortable" on that kind of dough in those locales for 4 months. Even with the Inca Trail and transportation. That said, you'd have a helluva good time on that sort of budget.

$2000 a month, however, might be a little too optimistic when it comes to Argentina and (especially, as Elijah points out) Brazil, but it is certainly doable. If only because you're really not going to need the full $2k/mo in Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, or Bolivia if you're a frugal traveler. In my misspent youth (which, unlike Static, wasn't that long ago), I managed on about half that. Altogether, I think you can make it on the $8k, but I'd suggest cutting your countries down to three or four. (Hell, I could spend 4 months in Colombia alone without need for anything else. I feel the same way about Argentina, and you might too.)

I'll also ditto Elijah's suggestion that you start backward, beginning your trip in the pricier locations. You can run on monetary fumes in Colombia. The same ain't true of Brazil, however.

Hope that helps.