paula10ac

Please help! I am overwhelmed with options. Flying into Santiago on Oct 31 and leaving Nov 19. I cannot figure out a logically route or how to get cheaper flights. Looking to do wine, penquins, glaciers, lakes and falls - and on a tight budget! Oh, I get motion sickness really easy and don't prefer buses!

kaneda

Flying is expensive in South America. You won't get any cheap flights there but if you don't like long distance coaches, you're stuck with them. Don't even think of flying over the Cuzco lines (in a small plane like a roller coaster ride).

toid

Kaneda is not correct, there are cheap flights in Chile, between Chile and Brazil and very cheap flights to Buenos Aires. For 3 weeks, 1 week or less for central Chile, 1 week or more for the south and 1 week or less in Buenos Aires.

faithie

We found very inexpensive domestic flights in both Central and South America....

kaneda

I thought they were fairly expensive. Why don't you give some links to these cheap sites, toid?

saltshaker

I'd love to know too. I live here and haven't found cheap flights! Toid must have some inside info that the rest of us don't...

paula10ac

I have found cheap flights on Sky Airline but it only offers one flight a day to southern chile. Is there a cheaper way to get LAN airlines cheaper? They have better times available but their prices are more than 3 times that of SKY.

FauxSteMarie

The problem with flights to South America is that service is limited. It is not like the US where several airlines compete with each other with sales when they are worried about empty seats. I just got back from Chile and with LAN and American being the only airlines to fly there from the US, the price is the price and you either go or not. It is very different than trying to score a flight to Europe.

I do not know about in country flights in Chile. I did take them but they were arranged by Elderhostel (the organizer of the tour). I do recommend that you concentrate on one country and not try and jump around all over. It's a big continent and even with 2 weeks in the wonderful country of Chile, we just really scratched the surface. The tour went to Santiago-Temuco (by plane)-Puerto Montt (bus)- 6 day cruise to the Glacier San Rafael on Skorpios II - Santiago (plane).

Please note that I would be very hesitant to rent a car in Chile. It is not like Europe where you get on the highway and just drive all over. Many roads are just dirt once you get off the main highway--especially south of Puerto Montt. To get from Puerto Montt to Puerto Arenas the quickest (and I use the word "quickest" but in no way suggest it is quick) way is to drive all the way down Chiloe and take the ferry back to the mainland. The problem is that the water can get rough, you get held up at the ferry dock, etc. Going for a limited period of time I would fly or rely on Chilean bus service. No way I would drive on the dirt roads. You do need to take extra tires and know how to fix a car at least temporarily if you you are going by car. Between Santiago and Puerto Montt there is a two lane toll road that is just like the roads in Europe. When it ends, that is where your problems begin.

The Chileans do intend to build a road to Puerto Arenas and eventually to Tierra del Fuego, but it is going to take years due to the rough terrain. Basically there are roads in some of the towns that go out of the towns for short distances and turn to dirt when the terrain gets rough. Lonely Planet publishes an excellent map of Chile. Get it and have a look and you will understand what I am talking about.

I thought the tour I took was great for a first experience in South America. I travel solo all the time in Europe, but did not feel doing so in South America. Chile, by the way is relatively safe (one of our group was the victim of a camera snatch in Valparaiso but that was it for that sort of thing). The water is safe to drink. I thought Chile had a very European feel to it especially in Santiago and Valparaiso. There is a lot more influence from the indigenous Mapuche culture around Temuco which is very interesting.

woodie

Hello paula10ac:

We went to southern chile mid Jan last year and began our travel from Punta Arenas and on to Santiago, then to Buenos Aires, retuned home mid March.

There is great penguin sighting in Punta Arenas [not so good tour operator - Turismo Runner].

Were I to go again, I would reserve the same hotel, Rey Jorge and chance booking the penguin tour on my own once down there or perhaps have the hotel do it for me. Find out the penguin tour schedule in advance so you do not get there and find you will or have missed a chance.

We had lots of time going north and stopped in a number of places.

There are few permanent residents in these towns so the hotels often have about 25 rooms, not more.

With that small of a population, the infrastructure is sparse. I would not expect to get much of a break on air travel since it is a tourist base use and tourists traditionally must pay top dollar.

I suggest that you use a travel agent to book your hotels. As foreign travellers we did not have to pay the VAT. As I recall that was around a whopping 12 to 18 % for the hotel rooms. You will find it cheaper to use a good agent. One hotel also gave us the same break on our meals if we paid un US money. We did so with a credit card.

We were very happy with Mercedes at Argentina Escapes out of Buenos Aires. We found her to be quite knowledgable, honest and dependable. Honest was important as we paid for a 9 week vacation all in advance. Hotels, travel, tours and special events.

For the most part, we found the people great. They were considerate, helpful and very friendly.

Sea food great in the south, coffee lousy. Would you believe they use instant! Great coffee in Argentina. They use real coffee.

Hope this is of some help to you. Have a great trip and take lots of film/photo chips, what ever.

Woodie