It’s time for another collection of the best travel stories on the web, from the award-winning webzine Perceptive Travel.

One of the features is mine this time, a piece on getting to the roots of good coffee by visiting farms where the beans are grown. Come along for the ride to Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia in Alert in the Americas.

On Ontario’s remote Moose Factory Island, where the Cree First Nation is cautiously courting tourism, Carolyn Heller learns that there’s more to see than the “sights.” See Going Where No Roads Go in Ontario.

Lea Aschkenas heads into the Amazon jungle of Ecuador and fights discomfort and insects to appreciate the teeming life around her.

Graham Reid checks out some new and noteworthy world music. Afro-soul, Indo-jazz, desert blues, and “Autotune goes to Africa.”

Travel book reviews from William Caverlee include Encounters from a Kayak, Food Lover’s Guide to the World, and On This Earth, A Shadow Falls.

As usual, we’re giving away some cool travel gear as well. Last month someone scored a new pair of hiking shoes from Wolverine. This month we’re giving away a whole Travelling Light package from Sea to Summit. The winner will take home a daypack that compresses down into a tiny pouch, a mesh laundry bag, Travelling Light See Pouches, and a travel wallet. If you’re on our newsletter list already, check your inbox or bulk folder. If not, sign up here to get in on the action next time. You can also follow Perceptive Travel on Facebook and watch for the contest questions.

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.

If you’re visiting a big city on almost any continent and are looking to stretch your budget, try to time your travels so that you will have all of Sunday there.

Most long-term travelers figure this out eventually, but I was reminded of this strategy again when I was in Bogota, Colombia this past weekend. As I’ve talked about before in Quito and Mexico City, a main avenue running through the city is blocked off to traffic, opening it up for anyone wanting to ride a bike in safety.

That’s just the start though. In many cities this is the most likely time for free outdoor concerts and cultural events. After all, it’s when you’re going to have the best chance of getting a crowd. Since many weekend visit tourists are gone by the afternoon, you’ll be mingling with locals more than foreigners too, which is always interesting.

Free museum days can vary a lot and I know in popular cities like NYC or Paris they will usually be on a certain weekday each month to keep the numbers down, but for many other countries it’s politically favorable to make the free day whenever the most families can visit. So when I visited the Gold Museum in Bogota a few days ago, the normal 3,000 peso ($1.75—still a bargain) entrance fee was waived.

Guidebooks will usually tell you this info, but double-check it online to be sure. This is a case where the official city tourism site is usually your best bet as it’s kept up to date and will link directly to the museum/attraction.

The one downside of all this is you may find places more crowded than usual, so time it earlier or later than the masses to avoid a crush. The flip side of that is you’ll get a real taste of who lives in a place, which can be enlightening.

Have fun!

The general public is starting to come around to the idea that Colombia is no longer some scary place you should avoid in your travels. Most of them still don’t know though how really unbelievably great Cartagena is.

No, this is not one of the world’s cheapest destinations. Far from it actually since Cartagena has the bulk of Colombia’s true luxury hotels and an array of great restaurants. But if you compare it to some equally picturesque city in Europe, it’s definitely a terrific value. Plus the Brazilians are coming to Colombia by the planeload for their vacations, so it’s definitely a better deal than there.

Here are a few photos to check out from the streets at night, just because that’s when I’ve been there thus far. I’m checking out what’s happening at a trade show called TravelMart Latin America and the business part of that is a convention center outside of town. My hotel is on the beach though—a nice trade-off. That’s another cool thing about this city: it’s got a gorgeous colonial center, but you can go swimming in the warm Caribbean waters too.

There aren’t a whole lot of places in the Americas where you’ve got an old city behind a surviving walled fortress. Campeche in Mexico, a wall left in St. Augustine in Florida, and then this one that’s absolutely huge. It’s all still there, holding strong, and you can walk along much of it, day or night. Grab a beer from a vendor that you’re welcome to drink on the street and stroll the ramparts. It’s cute to see smooching couples in spots where the cannons used to be mounted.

I flew on dreaded Spirit Air to get here, but it was around $450 from Tampa with all the damned fees, a mere two hour flight from Ft. Lauderdale and it’s on Central Standard Time: no jet lag to face. I’m coming back for sure, for vacation next time.

It’s a new month and time for a new issue of Perceptive Travel, home to the best travel stories from book authors on the move.

No one will ever accuse us of pandering to the masses by featuring stories about the world’s most popular destinations. Sure, getting to Chattanooga is not all that hard, but how about parts of Colombia where the FARC used to rein and the northernmost point of dirt-road Australia?

Lisa TE Sonne makes her debut recalling the voices inside her head fighting over whether she should take to the air and go hang gliding off Lookout Mountain in Tennessee. Richard McColl, author of a guidebook on Colombia, takes a true adventure journey through an area that was not too long ago known more for coke production and where rebels held kidnap victims—not tourism. Graham Reid often reviews world music for Perceptive Travel, but this time he’s bumping along remote parts of the Outback in North Queensland, Australia, where you can still manage to find a pub.

Susan Griffith returns to cover three travel books, which range widely in subject and quality, then Laurence Mitchell is back with world music reviews—including one with the great title Rock the Tabla.

We always give away something cool to one of our newsletter subscribers and Facebook followers who enter the monthly giveaway. Last month Stacey W. of Arizona won a great laptop tote from Overland Equipment. September’s prize is a $200 value WS4 Carabiner Watch from Timex. It will tell you where you’re going, how high you are, and what the weather is like. Oh, and what time it is.

See the Perceptive Travel home page for details or go straight to the new issue.