Brian and Jackie Cross: Trip 22 - South America via Spain

Trip 22 - South America via Spain

23rd October 2024 to (possibly) 22nd April 2025

After a summer of house renovating, a wedding, a via ferrata holiday in the Italian Dolomites, a Kenyan safari trip and several UK houseits in various places in the UK, we are heading out for a potential six month tour of South-America, taking in Peru, Bolivia and the Salt Flats, the Atacama desert, Easter Island and the fjords in Chile, the Lake District and Buenos Aires in Argentina, Montevideo in Uruguay, Rio de Janeiro and Iguazu falls in Brazil and the Amazon forest, the Galapagos and a Christmas housesit in Ecuador, possibly finishing with a repositioning cruise back home.

We started with a 10 day visit to Spain to see Jackie's dad Richard and wife Elizabeth and then flew to Arequipa in Peru to commence our travels. We stayed in Arequipa for 4 nights, taking a tour to the Salar quarries, then a two day tour to Colca Canyon and on to Puno on Lake Titikaka. We stayed there for three nights then had a night on an Uros floating island before returning to Puno for another two nights. Next was a Bolivia Hop bus to Copocabana in Bolivia, with the intention to stay on the Isla del Sol for a night then travelling on to La Paz for two nights, but protests and road blocks in Peru meant we didn't leave Puno until the afternoon, which meant we didn't make it to Copacabana, so instead went straight to La Paz for three nights. We then took a flight to Sucre for three nights then on to Potosi for another three nights. Uyuni was next for an amazing tour through the Salt Flats in Bolivia, the highlight of our trip so far, on to the Atacama desert of northern Chile at San Pedro de Atacama, from where we did some trips out into the desert.

Our route then took us on three flights, north to Quito in Ecuador. We stayed three nights, during which we did a free walking tour of the city, visited the Middle of the World monument on the equator and hiked up Cotopaxi volcano to the refuge. We followed that with two nights in Mindo cloud forest before returning to Quito, where we summited Rucu Pinchincha volcano.

The Amazon was calling next and that was our trip to a lodge in the Amazon forest of Ecuador for a four day all inclusive forest immersion with lots of birds and animals. We are now in Cuenca for a months housesit over Christmas and the New Year looking after three dogs and some rest and relaxation.

Our itinerary after that is work in progress over Christmas, some of which is booked. We hope to book onto a Galapagos trip for late January and then we've booked a 26 day cruise through the Chilean Fjords, Antarctica, the Falkland Islands and onto Buenos Aires. After that we carry on backpacking, hopefully picking up Argentinian lake district at Bariloche, Cordoba, Iguazu Falls, Rio de Janeiro and, hopefully Manaus in the Brazilian Amazon if (I can persuade Jackie), but all that is yet to be worked out. We'll try to update it here as we go but what you may be reading here may already be out of date, depending on internet connection and time.

The map below has place markers (in various colours to denote the month) showing the places we will stay as we go along with lines showing our route. Click on each place marker to see details with photos.

Below are links to the blog posts we are making on the way. Click on each one to read where we've been, what we saw and what we did. It will be updated as we go along. Happy reading!

Here's a map of our intended route. To see it properly you'll need to click on the little square in the top right corner which will take it to full screen. It opens a new tab and you'll be able to browse round, zoom in and click on each marker to show more details. At the moment it's work in progress as we haven't finalised all our trip. We'll do it as we go along

And here's the blog posts of our journey, updated as we go:

23th October to 1st November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-1-to-10-stage-1-spain.html

2nd to 6th November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-11-to-15-stage-2-peru.html

7th to 10th November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-16-to-19-stage-3.html

10th to 12th November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-19-to-21-stage-4.html

13th to 16th November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-22-to-25-stage-5.html

17th to 19th November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-26-to-28-stage-6-la.html

20th to 22nd November: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/11/south-america-days-29-to-31-stage-7.html

23rd to 1st December: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/12/south-america-days-36-to-39-stage-9.html

2nd to 7th December: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/12/south-america-days-40-to-46-stage-10.html

7th to 9th December: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/12/south-america-days-46-to-48-stage-11.html

10th to 12th December: https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2024/12/south-america-days-49-to-51-stage-12.html