Aerolineas Argentinas etc.
 

We are planning a trip to Chile and Argentina in April. Our international flights are in and out of Santiago. We would like to fly Santiago - Mendoza; Mendoza- Salta and then back to Mendoza. We are thinking of taking the bus back to Santiago from Mendoza. It looks like a beautiful ride. Has anyone had experience with the Aerolineas Argentina visit South Ameriaca and visit Argentina air pass? Any thoughts on the bus trip? Thanks for your help!

We took that bus trip last year and it was terrific. Recommend it to anyone. We lucked out by getting to the bus station over an hour early, being first in line, and grabbing one of the upper deck front seats. Ride there!

Good advice above about the bus crossing of the Andes.

If your schedule permits, try to avoid Aerolíneas Argentinas altogether!

Have a great time in our country.

Thank you. We are definitely going to do the bus trip. I am very concerned about Aerolineas Argentina, but there schedule works for our trip( they fly Mendoza- Salta without going to BA. As far as I can tell no other airline does this. They also have a late evening flight to Mendoza from Santiago . We will be arriving in Santiago from easter Island and can then go directly to Mendoza.There price with the Visit Argentina pass is very good. Is there problem delayed flights or safety?

That´s why I said: "if your schedule permits".

I´d say the problem is more of delayed flights and that kind of thing than anything else.

See post 7 here: http://tinyurl.com/mjrzru5

Have a great time in our country.

I was travelling in Argentina in November-December 2011. Not one of the AA flights left on time, flights were cancelled/consolidated without prior notice "we've put you on a later flight, it's less full" - rubbish, they just consolidated two flights, so we arrived in BA after 10.30 at night. And so on. Fly LAN if you can - much more reliable in my experience.

We travelled with Aerolineas just a few weeks ago from stinking hot Buenos Aires to freezing cold El Calafate, and in which case, they lost the whole planes baggage (who knows how?!)
They didn't apologize at all and we had to wait 2 days in Patagonia without any luggage for our bags to show up (the hotel had to ring the airline countless times). We ended up buying snow gear in El Calafate as we needed it and can hopefully claim back on insurance. I would definitely avoid them!

Would you consider the bus from Mendoza to Salta? It is a fairly long trip, 18 hours I think, but the best service is extremely comfortable and most of the time you would be travelling through the night.

The bus trip to Salta seems very long. We were hoping to fly Santiago to Mendoza and Mendoza Salta and back to Salta with the areolinas Argentina visit Argentina air pass . Has anyone had any decent experiences with this airline? It is really the most convenient way for us to do this trip.