Backpacking South America

Lately, we’ve been asked about where we are going and what we will be doing. So I decided to document our travel plans as they stand prior to our departure. For some portions, we have a pretty clear and defined plan. For the rest, we hope to follow a general path – always leaving the possibility to change our plan and route at any moment. It should be interesting to track our route and see how much it deviates from this plan.

Boston-Argentina

Our trip from Boston to Buenos Aires will be detoured through NYC and Mexico City. We will be leaving Boston on 8/17 and plan to spend a couple days in NYC with brother, sister-in-law and nephew. Our flight leaves 8/19 from JFK, with a 12 hour layover in Mexico City. From the Juarez International Airport, we’ll catch a cab, head to the Zocalo and spend an afternoon in and around the plaza before heading back to the airport for the final leg of our flight. From there, it’s on to Buenos aires for an 11am arrival on August 20th. We will be spending the first few days familiarizing and acclimating to the city.

This post has been updated as of January 2009

The New Year is a long way off, so a lot can and likely will change.  Our trip plan becomes a bit less defined at this point.  We hope that encounters with fellow travelers will help shape our exact itinerary, but we have a general plan of heading south along route 40, which lies in the shadows of the Andes.

Lakes District and Patagonia

We will be making frequent stops in mountain towns like Bariloche and El Bolson, the Welsh villages of Esquel and Trevelin, and a visit Parque Nacional Los Glaciares – home to the world’s third largest ice cap.  All this as we make our way to the southern most city in the world – Ushuaia.  We intend to take our time, enjoy the scenery, and likely fight the summer vacation crowds along the way.

Chile

Once we reach the bottom of the continent, it will be time to make our way back north.  At this point, our trip will decidely shift to a focus on Chile. Our first destination with be Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, where We’ll head out on a 5-7 day hike through the park.  After exhausting ourselves with the hike, we will take a few shorter hikes and hopefully spend a couple days kayaking in fjords of Chilean Patagonia.

Our first destination on our adventure is Buenos Aires. We will be arriving the morning of August 20th. We’ll be spending time in the city, and starting school on the 24th.

We should have lots of updates on impressions of the city, reviews of restaurants, hostels and a list of places we’ve visited.

We are really excited to call Buenos Aires our first home away from home.

August 19.  The date had always seemed so far away.  For a long time, it existed merely as an idea or concept.  It wasn’t set in stone.  We weren’t committed to leaving, we still had an escape route.

Now its concrete.  We have a one way tickets to Buenos Aires, we’ve notified our landlords, we gave our notice at work.  August 19 is a concrete, immovable date that signifies the next chapter in our lives.

Stay tuned as we develop this site and embark on our 6-12 month journey to South America.