Trip Wrap up

 Dec 14, 2025

It was one loooonnnggg day getting all the way from Iguazu back to Seattle.  We got up in Iguazu at 5:30am for a quick breakfast, pack and the bus to the airport to fly back to Buenos Aires.  All the groups flights back to the US left in the evening so to we all shared two hotel rooms during the afternoon to clean up and repack for the return trip. I spent part of the afternoon with Jorge in a sports bar (see below). I actually got some sleep in the business class lie-down seats but it was not much more than dozing. Lyn and I parted company in Huston and I got home about 3pm today.  I spent part of the plane ride putting together this blog post (which may be little more than a bunch of random words based on how tired I feel now.

Our whole group

At the end of a trip I like to sum up some of the highlights, problems and maybe some statistics just for future reference.  To start with, the statistics.  I was gone from Seattle 20 and 1/2 days taking eight different flights. To and from South America had two flights each.  That still meant 10 different airport transfers; to and from with associated waiting, security lines, baggage drops-pickups, etc.  All went fairly smoothly with no major glitches but still what a lot of mostly yucky time spent. A rough estimate of total time in transit of one sort or another was about 89 hours of the 492 hours for the whole trip or about 18% of the time. That doesn’t include the many bus rides to and from hotels as part of what we were seeing or doing for touristing.  The bus (and ship time) while in transit were usually interesting in what we were seeing and hearing about from the guides so definitely does not count as “yucky” time, even though one is not “doing” something. 

The “doing” was mostly walks or hikes (or eating).  My iPhone step counter says I walked an average of 11,500 steps a day with a high of 26,000 and a low of 6,500.  The “official” hikes as part of the tour were generally very good.  I usually picked the more challenging ones when there was a choice and was pushed a bit faster/harder than I would of on my own.  I like to be physically pushed a bit but it did mean I sometimes didn’t have as much time as I would have liked to enjoy just being where the hikes got us. Having more hiking time for the same places would have been nice.  Also, I am not used to being “guided”.  Being herded in a group is not my cup of tea but I understand that on tours like this one that is all that can be done.

What about the place?  Argentina and Chile are basically western, almost European-like countries so not very exotic like Morocco was last year.  Getting lost in downtown Buenos Aires was much more of a challenge than doing so in the Medina of Fez and not nearly as rewarding. That being said it was still great fun to get a little aquainted with these South American cultures and very interesting to hear some of the history and politics.  The Patagonia part of the trip was certainly special.  In retrospect I am realizing that much of the topography, climate and scenery is similar to western British Columbia or south-eastern Alaska.   The glaciers were fun to see but nothing that special for me since I have lots of experience around and on glaciers. However, the flora and fauna are totally different. Not being a birder or botanist I found looking at the biology fun and interesting but other tour members certainly got more out of these aspects than I.  The two big WOW sites were Torres del Paine and Iguazu Falls.  Having seen photos of these I knew they would be special but being there in person was as good or better than I had hoped. A surprising highlight for me was the afternoon at the sheep ranch near Ponta Arenas.  The place was beautiful and hearing about it and the gaucho life was interesting  Horse back riding was much better than I expected. While the location was not as exotic as the camel ride last year, sitting a horse was way more comfortable and controlling it myself more fun.

Now for comments about Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT).  Like for Abdu in  Morocco last year our guide, Jorge was great.  Since we were in different countries and very different types of places he relied on local guides more than Abdu did.  That being said Jorge still provided lots of information and was always cheerful with little jokes and language suggestions. There were certainly some challenges wrangling our group through all the different airplanes, boats and buses and many combinations. He gave credit to the OAT office folks backing him up to make sure all the parts fit together as they should. Indeed it was flawless.  I do think the compatibility and competency of our group made his job fairly easy.  No one was ever late and no one (other than me) got separated causing him anxiety. I hope I made up for my little "oops" by helping his home football (soccer) team, Flamingo win both the Club South American Cup and also the semi-finals of the Club Intercontinental Cup against Pyramid from Egypt.  I accompanied Jorge to sports bars for both of these matches and take, at least partial credit for the Flamingo victories.  I will be watching with interest and thinking good thoughts on Wednesday when they play PSG for the championship (of the world).

At half time with Flamingo already up two goals

As mentioned our tour group was great. Everyone got along very well and seemed to enjoy the whole experience.  I got to know all of them, at least a bit and found everyone interesting and enjoyable to “hang out” with. Most even seemed to humor my periodic stupid jokes and learned to not take me too seriously.  What about the senior “Malone Brothers”, Lyn and me traveling together?  Like all siblings we had a few rough times but quickly patched things up and got along just fine. Our travel styles are quite different Lyn being more into a slower pace and comfort and me being more of a dirtbag. I learned to tolerate traveling business class and she seemed to adapt to the many early morning departures and the go, go, go of some days.  We usually did not hang out just the two of us together but rather socialized individually with others in our group.  We did come up with a tradition of doing a paired selfie at many of the iconic spots. 

OK, crashing now.  Good night.