Southern Bolivia

A few years back I wrote an article for Transitions Abroad that I updated this month: Budget Travel in South America.

It’s not meant to be a comprehensive country-by-country rundown, but rather a strategy guide to where your money will stretch and what you can expect to pay in general terms. Then at the end there are some resources to turn to for more specifics.

Traveling on a budget in this region has gotten a lot more complicated since I did the first version of that article five years ago. Argentina has become a fiscal basket case again and on top of that they added a reciprocal visa fee that’s payback for what we charge them to enter our own countries. A family of four would now pay around $560 before exiting the airport. This same fee is in place in Chile, Bolivia, and Brazil, which is probably part of the reason those countries get far fewer visitors than Peru, Ecuador, and now Colombia.

Cartagena, Colombia

If you watch financial news regularly, you’ll know that the resource-based economies around the world have been on a roll. Those that have lots of things to extract from the ground have seen their economies boom. In the developed world that means places like Canada and Australia. In South America it means Peru, Chile, and Brazil. Those latter two have gotten far more expensive when their currencies appreciate and Brazilians are now the free-spending travelers of the Americas, buying up a storm wherever they go. (And saving Argentina’s tourism industry in the process.) Colombia has been on a roll—too much of one actually. The government is frantically buying dollars to slow down the appreciation of its currency.

So where would I say you should go if you wanted to backpack through South America for a few months or more? I’d say you should fly to Central America first, because you can do it more cheaply with money or miles, then make your way through Panama and either fly or take a boat to Colombia. Spend a few weeks in semi-expensive Colombia, then go overland to Ecuador and watch your money instantly buy twice as much. (Except liquor and wine, which just doubled in price there this year.)

Chivay, Peru

You’d then continue down to Peru, hitting the highlights in a leisurely fashion from north to south, then enter Bolivia via Lake Titicaca. You’d make your way overland down to the Salar de Uyuni, spend some time around there, then bus it over to Salta in Argentina. Go overland to Iguazu Falls and then Buenos Aires, taking a detour to Uruguay somewhere along the way by land or ferry. Then take a series of very long bus rides down to Bariloche. Explore Patagonia there and in Chile, then fly up to Santiago. From there if you still have money left, you could spend some time in wine country and Valparaiso in Chile or fly to Brazil for some coastal time. Or head home, or back to Central America, or Mexico.

They key in all of this is to take your time! Distances between many of these locations are vast. Chile end-to-end is the distance of the west coast of the U.S. to the east coast, to give you an idea. These bus trips are so long you get a sleeping berth. You can cut off a lot of time flying, but domestic flights are no bargain except for a few routes like La Paz to Sucre. Trying to be a box-checking, bucket-listing, country-counting flashpacker is going to cost you far more money and part of your sanity.

For a country-by-country breakdown of these destinations and others around the globe, pick up a copy of the new 4th edition of The World’s Cheapest Destinations.

Last week I was in Bolivia and it was dirt cheap. (See this post with prices.) This week I’ve been in Chile and I’m paying more than I would at home. As soon as I crossed the border, most prices went up by a factor of four.

It’s kind of hard to get your head around this fact sometimes, but countries that are right next to each other can charge drastically different prices for travelers. Right now I’m talking about southern Bolivia and San Pedro de Atacama in Chile. But you can see this strange effect play out in the U.S and Mexico, Austria and Hungary, Singapore and Malaysia, Jordan and Israel, Belize and Guatemala. Step across a line and you go from poor to rich in a hurry. Or vice-versa.

I’ll go on record as saying there’s no such thing as doing “Atacama on the cheap.” San Pedro de Atacama is a cool little tourist town in the middle of a whole bunch of interesting things to see. It’s a great place to come on vacation, especially if you can stay in one of the fantastic all-inclusive places I did for a while (on a writing assignment) where everything is bundled together and you don’t have to think about it. If you’re on a long-term backpacking trip, however, and are watching the budget, look out!

This is an area where it makes no sense to come here if you can’t go on adventure excursions. Those cost $15 to $50 per person, so even doing two or three is going to cost you bigtime. On top of that you’ll pay as much for a coffee as you would at a Starbucks at home, you’ll pay as much for a fruit shake as you would at Smoothie King, and you’ll pay more for a beer than you would in your local pub.

Even at happy hour, a cocktail is more than 9 dollars.

When I went from Bolivia to Chile, ice cream went up by a factor of five, meals by a factor of four, taxi rides by a factor or four, drinks by a factor of four, and hostel/hotels by a factor of three. Same with souvenirs. You could plausiby argue that the food is much better, but the other things are the same—they just cost more. One country is poor, the other is not. Prices reflect this—even the public toilet prices.

Here are the very few pieces of advice I could conjure for saving a few bucks in the Atacama Desert:

1) Rent a bike.
You can rent a bicycle here, with lock and helmet, for around $6.50 for a half day, $12 a full day. There are a few attractions you can reach by bike on your own if you get good directions, including the Cejar salt lagoon. Plus if you follow the main Caracoles street a few blocks to the west you’ll find an awesome area for mountain biking.

2) Take a local bus to Calama.
Lots of agencies sell expensive transfers to the airport in Calama. But the local bus is a shade over $5 and is comfortable. You’ll have to catch a cab on the other end though, which will cost more than the bus.

3) Bring a water purifier.
Bottled water is more expensive than in your home country and you’ll go through gallons of it in this dry, high-altitude weather. Locals drink the tap water and though that’s probably not a great idea for you, a UV filter will render it fine for even the most sensitive stomachs.

4) Pick your excursions carefully.
It costs $15 to $40 per person to do most any excursion from San Pedro, so obviously you can’t do everything on the long list of menu items. If you’ve been to geysers elsewhere, the ones here probably won’t give you much of a thrill, especially when sharing them with 200 other tourists. Same for the flamingos. If you live in Arizona, a cactus hike is probably a huge waste of money. If you live in Utah or Israel, salt lagoons are probably not a big thrill. Decide which options truly get you excited and sign up for those.

5) Go see the stars.
It’s free to see more constellations that you may have ever seen in your life. And from a different southern viewpoint. The middle of town won’t cut it though, so head out to a darker place, then look up to see a thousand twinkling suns.

The latest issue of Perceptive Travel contains, as usual, some of the best travel stories on the web. But this time they all focus on other superlatives.

Shelley Seale makes her debut with a story on the people of the Atacama Desert in Chile, living in what is reportedly the driest place on Earth.

Laurie Gough, author of Kiss the Sunset Pig, is back with a piece on what some studies have found to be the happiest place on Earth: Bhutan. Which makes her wonder: Can a country using happiness as a guiding principle really deliver—despite intrusions from the outside world?

Bruce Northam, author of Globetrotter Dogma, returns with a story on Rio in Brazil, but not the Rio you see in all the glossy tourism brochures. But it’s really about a happy dog…

Laurence Mitchell reviews a batch of new world music releases, including one that chronicles the music of Byzantium, I mean Constantinople, I mean Istanbul. Susan Griffith checks out some notable new travel books, on Paris and Central America.

See the whole December 2011 issue here.

As always, we’re giving away a cool prize to newsletter subscribers and Facebook followers. This month it’s two different backpacks from Guerrilla Packs. Two readers are going to get nice post-holiday presents. To figure out how to get in the running, see the home page of Perceptive Travel.

If you’ve ever embarked on a multi-country trip or are planning a round-the-world journey, you know that digging up the current visa information is a daunting task. Much of what’s on the web is out of date or just plain wrong and consular sites aren’t known for being simple to navigate. Plus some countries don’t require one, some charge different nationalities different amounts, some change you if you arrive by air but not overland, some try to disguise their visa fee under a different name, and on it goes.

If hours of your time are worth more than ten bucks, there’s a new e-book out that can save you a lot of hassles. Christine Gilbert, a working nomad who runs the Almost Fearless blog, has just put out The Visa Book.

At this point it’s only for U.S. citizens and it just covers tourist visas, not ones for working or staying longer; you’ll have to follow the included links to dig around for those. Still, we have to cough up some cash to visit 40% of the countries of the 200 covered here, so this gives you the one-stop lowdown on the where, the how, and the how much for all of them. For the countries I know well the information was solid in my proofing. Since this is a digital book, a new edition will come out each year.

This is an attractively laid out book that’s easy to navigate. For most countries it provides what you need to know on one or two pages and then provides links on where to go for more. If you’ve got a lot of countries to visit in the near future, get the scoop on everywhere from Botswana to Mauritania to Vietnam.

Most Expensive Visa Charges for Americans

So where will you get reamed the worst? There are plenty of countries that are in the Ben Franklin club—costing more than $100 to enter—but some are places you probably wouldn’t go anyway, like Angola, Algeria, Sudan, or Pakistan. Here are the ones that are the most expensive among places you actually may want to visit.

Argentina (Buenos Aires airport arrival only)
Bolivia
Brazil
Chile (Good for life of passport)
Kyrgyzstan
Russia
Suriname
Tanzania

Plan your route accordingly if you’re on a budget!

Get your copy of The Visa Book download here.

Fish Market in Santiago (pescada $2.40 a kilo)

Usually when I’m doing one of these price rundowns for a country, it’s to show you what a bargain it is in one of The World’s Cheapest Destinations. When I went on a trip to Chile this past week for a wine tourism article though, I knew that would not be the case. Chile is, in most respects, at the top of the pyramid in Latin America. It’s got the most stable government, the best infrastructure, water you can drink, and a great airline—LAN.

So traveling here feels like it does in most developed nations: predictable (in a good way), hygenic, safe, and well…easy. There are a few relative bargains, but for restaurant meals, airport taxis, and hotels, expect to pay about what you would in the U.S. Especially now with the exchange rate around 500 pesos to the dollar.

The Santiago Metro will get you around most of the city for a buck in off-peak hours, a bit more during rush hour. Here’s more on that in English from the Urban Rail site. A short taxi ride will only cost you a few dollars and riding one of the 17 funicular trains up the hills of Valparaiso will only cost you around 25 cents U.S. Long-distance buses are nice and comfortable and cost $2 to $6 per hour of travel depending on the class. The best overnight bus from Santiago to Puerto Varas, for example, is $60 for 10 hours, while the cheapest is $26 for 12 hours.

Chilean wine is one of the world’s best values, as you’ve probably noticed already by browsing your local store. If you’re going to spend $10 or less on a bottle of Cabernet, Chardonney, Savignon Blanc, or a blended red, your odds of getting something really good are better if it’s from Chile than from anywhere else. (In the interest of research, I tried about 100 wines the past week, so I should know.) Buying locally in Chile, there are only a few labels that can top the $20 mark at retail, so you drink well there and the mark-up at restaurants as in Argentina is low enough that most everyone orders wine with dinner.

Seafood is abundant and reasonable, though again you’ll pay more for it here than in neighboring countries. In general the food is excellent, whether you’re eating at a great locals’ hangout like Liguria—where most dishes are under $10—or a fancy “tough to get a reservation” place like Pasta E Vino at The Aubrey.

The price that really hurts the most in Chile though is the one you’ll pay just to enter the country: $140 if you’re American. You’re down that much plus your long-haul flight cost before you even step out of the airport. That hurts. It’s good for the life of your passport, but if you’re like me and up for renewal soon, you’re SOL on that. You’ve just made a fat donation to the Chilean government and you won’t even get a thank-you note.