Starting the planning...

I've spent many hours over the past week sitting in the aisles of bookstores, reading guidebooks and blocking other peoples' access to the travel section. As a result, I've been getting more and more excited about the trip. The more I learn and plan, the more real the trip becomes (which is good, because its going to feel pretty damn real when I arrive, alone, in a country whose language I barely speak). It's also been interesting looking at the variation, or lack thereof, among the different books. The information in all of them appears to be very similar -- the difference is in their target audience and in their presentation.

I wound up grabbing the lonely planet guidebooks for Chile and Argentina. From what I've been able to find in these books, as well as other books on the shelves on bookstores, talking to Tyler (who just got back from a six week trip in Peru, Chile, and Argentina), and the web, I've been putting together an itinerary in my head. Generally, I don't have a whole lot of use for a very strict itinerary, as travel plans change, and it's hard to predict what a place is going to be like, let alone the weather and crowd conditions, from a description in a guidebook. So, I have no intention of writing an itenerary that is set in stone.

While forming the itinerary, I'm trying to keep in mind my experience that the longer you spend in one place, the more interesting it becomes and the more you get out of it. There are obviously limits to this, but the central point is that the "whirlwind tour of ..." approach to traveling, sucks. However, it's difficult to keep that in mind when facing over 1,000 pages of descriptions of places I'd like to visit. I don't have a feel, right now, for how I'll handling traveling alone, or for what I'll like and dislike, so it's difficult to pare down the list. Ultimately, I'm thinking that a list of potential destinations along a route will be more useful than any sort of fixed list of what to visit and what to skip.

All that said, here's a possible start on the first leg of the trip:

Leg 1: Lima, Peru to Coyhaique, Chile
Dec 1, 2003 - Jan 15, 2004

Week 1: Spend 1 or 2 days around Lima. Travel south to Arequipa. Spend the remainder of the week around Arequipa and Lake Titicaca.
Week 2: Cross the border south into Chile. See Arica, spend some time on the beaches there?, then head west to PN Lauca. Spend a few days there hiking, and generally acclimating. Maybe climb some of the volcanos in the park. (Possibly, in the later part of this week or early week 3, visit San Pedro de Atacama, see El Tatilo Geysers and La Valle de la Luna. Renting a bike here sounds like a good option.)
Week 3: Head farther south. I should aim to make it Santiago by mid-to-late week 3. See Valpraiso and Santiago
Week 4: Christmas in ???
Week 5: New years in ???
Week 6: End this week by arriving in Coyhaique, with a few days to rest before the NOLS trip starts.

I've only made it part way through the northernmost district of Chile, and I'm already looking at the middle part of Week 3. Six weeks sounds like a long time, but when you consider that Chile is over 2,000 miles long, it seems much shorter. Especially when Chile has Peru and Bolivia to the north, and Argentina right next door. I think I'd be much wiser to write a list of attractions, organized from north to south, for this leg of the trip. Perhaps I will start on that tomorrow.

Posted by vanwie at September 28, 2003 01:28 AM