South America Cruise

[indyrocks]

We are beginning to make more detailed plans for our 2-week Santiago to Buenos Aires cruise on the Star Princess in February. The itinerary is Santiago, CL -- Puerto Montt, CL -- Puerto Chacabuco, CL -- Punta Arenas, CL -- Ushuaia, AR -- Stanley, FK -- Montevideo, UY -- Buenos Aires, AR (overnight). A few questions have come up which I hope you helpful experienced travelers can answer.

1. Shore Excursions
   Since this is our first trip to South America we're planning to play it safe and stick with Princess Shore Excursions wherever possible. Are there any specific SE's that you'd recommend? At the other end of the spectrum, any SE's that we should avoid? Does anyone have any private excursions that you'd recommend?
2. Credit Cards
   Wherever possible we prefer to charge our purchases to MasterCard because of the protection it provides plus the lack of conversion charges for the account we have. But we're not sure how commonly MC is accepted in the areas we'll be visiting. Can anyone let us know what to expect?
3. Cash
   We usually get some local currency from our local bank before we leave, especially since we like to buy hand-made items from each country we visit and typically the smaller shops or kiosks understandably are cash only. But we're wondering if that is worthwhile for all 4 countries that we'll be visiting. With the bank's conversion fees it's not cheap, but getting $200-$300 worth of both Chilean and Argentinian currency before we leave is obvious. But the situation is not so clear for the other two countries. We have some UK currency left over from a recent trip and I've read that it is accepted in the Falklands, even though they have their own currency. And it really doesn't seem worth the cost to get Uruguayan pesos for a single 11-hour port visit. There's always ATMs or banks I guess, but sometimes a shopping opportunity pops up at the most unexpected times when you're far from either. Any experiences or recommendations to share? Also, is the US dollar accepted very often, as in the Caribbean? We're not US-centric enough to expect that, but it doesn't hurt to ask.

 

Thanks to anyone who can provide any information at all. Happy traveling!

[paul929207]

1. Shore excursions - There is a very wide range of prices for SE's in SA with Princess. The day trip to Antarctica is $3500 pp. Machu Picchu and Iquaso Falls are also very expensive. However, they are all great. Volunteer Point in the Falkland Islands is great.

2. US$ are commonly accepted. 

[fishywood]

There is a whole underground economy in Argentina for the US dollar. Most shops in Buenos Aires will have the conversion rate for $US in the window--for cash only of course, but it is 2 or 3 ARP per dollar more than you get from an ATM or bureau d'change.

 

In Punta Arenas Chile the big general store type shop at the terminal took CLP, ARP, USD, and Euros at reasonable exchange rates--for cash of course. I imagine this is the only place in the world outside Argentina where the very unstable ARP is acceptable currency.

 

In Punta Arenas and Puerto Montt I took all days ships tours that included lunch and uncharacteristically little free time for shopping, though it did appear that cash transactions were negotiable. The open air food & trinket stalls at the tender dock in Puerto Montt likely did take USD though I cannot vouch for the rate. I did learn that $1 did gain admission to the extremely grotty public toilets there which were doing bang up business due to the return tender line being 90+ minutes long as there were two ships in port and only one tender alternating between the two allowed in the water at a time.

 

The only tour to avoid is in Ushuaia; if you wish to go to Tierra del Fuego National Park I strongly suggest independent trasportation as on my cruise (on another lines' smaller ship than Princess uses on this itinerary) there was fourteen busloads taking the Beagle Channel plus National Park tour. While half did the tour in reverse there was still a collision of 700+ people at the midpoint--far more than the facilities and services could accommodate. Ushuaia is the best port for an "off the beaten path" excursion. 

Also note on my particular cruise the wildlife/penguin ships tours in Punta Arenas garnered so many complaints that 50% refunds were given to those who complained loud enough. Likely the issue was being so late in the season (first week of March) but I was thankful this was the port I chose for a Gaucho tour to a sheep farm; but many people I met onboard said the Gaucho tours in Montevideo were the best of their cruise.

[PurpleTraveller]

I was on Emerald Princess in March 2018 and found that for my one day in Uruguay I didn't spend much but I was able to use US$ even at street vendors as I didn't have any local currency. I took a small quantity of local currency for both Argentina and Chile as I spent extra time in both countries at either end of the cruise and it made life easier. In the Falklands I was able to use GBP from the UK with no problem. Just ask for any change to be given in GBP if possible, as you can not use Falkland pounds outside of the Falklands. 

 

The best shore excursion I have ever been on was to Volunteer Point in the Falklands with Estancia Excursions. An amazing day seeing hundreds of King penguins along with smaller numbers of Magellanic and Gentoo penguins - penguin heaven! Estancia Excursions were wonderful, very easy to communicate with and much cheaper than the Princess excursion. They do book out early so may not be available but you could look at the Princess excursion as Volunteer Point is amazing. In Ushuaia I went on the half day morning Princess excursion to Tierra del Fuego National Park and enjoyed it. It was not crowded and the scenery was beautiful. 

 

Have a great cruise! 

 

Edited January 11, 2019 by PurpleTraveller

[TheRabbit]

28 minutes ago, PurpleTraveller said:

The best shore excursion I have ever been on was to Volunteer Point in the Falklands with Estancia Excursions. An amazing day seeing hundreds of King penguins along with smaller numbers of Magellanic and Gentoo penguins - penguin heaven! Estancia Excursions were wonderful, very easy to communicate with and much cheaper than the Princess excursion. They do book out early so may not be available but you could look at the Princess excursion as Volunteer Point is amazing. In Ushuaia I went on the half day morning Princess excursion to Tierra del Fuego National Park and enjoyed it. It was not crowded and the scenery was beautiful. 

 

Have a great cruise! 

 

We used Patrick's Tour for Volunteer point. All the tours go to the same place, and I believe all use local drivers in their own 4x4s to make the trip. (I understand the drivers have a good party in the pub at the end.) in 2016 Princess was $400 each for this tour and Patrick's was half at $200. Seems we paid cash at the end of the tour. This was booked out at least 4 to 5 months before sailing and we went with a group of 48 from CC.

 

There were around 800 Kings (including some with eggs and some feeding chicks) and around 4000+ of the two other breads there along with a few sheep. We were there mid March for comparisons. I would rate this in our top five tours ever.

 

As for Tierra del Fuego National Park I did a taxi on our own as I only was interested in certain locations and did this in the afternoon. Was cheaper by Taxi by myself than with Princess, but you need to know where you want to go.

 

 

[TheRabbit]

Puerto Montt, CL

 

We did a Princess tour here up to the volcanoes and lakes. Take the tour with the lake cruise, it had great views. This is a German area and the town itself was very nice including the lunch.

[TheRabbit]

 Montevideo, UY

There are good wine tours available here.  We took a private tour here and did 2 wineries that were totally different but both were multi generation. Link is below, but not sure if he is still active. You would need to contact Ryan.

 

LINK

[Nebr.cruiser]

We did this cruise last year.  We only did private excursions, mostly arranged with others on our roll call, but then we almost never do ship tours.  

 

If you want specifics I can probably go back into my files and find out the names of specific tours.  We did not do a tour at all in in one port, picked up a tour at the dock in Puerto Montt, which was excellent and used Estancia in the Falklands--also excellent.  All of the tours to Volunteer Point use the same few local providers and people on the ship tours were doing the exact same route and sometimes the exact same drivers as independent tours at half or less of the price.  I even saw some people book a tour to Volunteer Point right on the dock.

 

We used pounds in the Falklands but US dollars everywhere else.  We don't buy many souvenirs though.  The only place that wouldn't take dollars was when we were at the beach town near Santiago.  Street vendors for drinks wan'ted Chilean money.

 

We had a great private tour in Ushauia that went to the park.

 

It was a great cruise.  Enjoy!

[Crewbie]

'lo - 

 

My family group recently just completed the LA-Santiago-Buenos Aires trip; it was also our first time in South America (and no Spanish-speaking fluency at all). We got through very well with USD, but our uses were just for payment and tips; no experience with smaller/local shops or vendors and not relying on taxis/local transport. Regarding shore excursions, I'd definitely say that the highlights for the ports are mostly the nature-oriented visits and that going by that theme will hopefully reliably yield some measure of 'time/money well spent' if that's within your interest (and the weather cooperates, of course). In more detail:

 

-Puerto Montt: Lake Esmeralda and Petrohue are lovely; we had a fortunate weather day and enjoyed our visit. Some groups/vendors did get to Osorno, but I can't speak from experience. If you're willing to join a Roll Call/independent group, a smaller shuttle will be able to make for some more stops and flexibility (stops along the river and lakeside, which the Princess tours did not do, and being able to attempt to dodge the large number of visitors that were arriving from the ship at the Petrohue Falls/Rapids site itself). Puerto Varas was pleasant, but I think we would have been disappointed with a visit that constituted seeing only Puerto Montt/Puerto Varas (the former seems to be in a construction/renovation phase). We used Puerto Montt Excursiones for our day there.

 

-Punta Arenas: I was pleasantly surprised by how walkable Punta Arenas was (although we visited when the city was essentially shut down on Christmas day) - paying for an city excursion might not be the most worthwhile option here. In our time of planning, we weren't interested in being too penguin-focused; if Magdalena Island isn't of interest, I can say that we were happy with a trip to Fort Bulnes/Park of the Strait of Magellan. The Park is located about an hour's scenic drive south along the coast from Punta Arenas - I was very glad to have a guide and vehicle to handle entrance tickets and transport (it's not so much a 'walking' park as a collection of sites, e.g., entry - gates - visitor's center - fort reconstruction all separated by five-minutes' driving on unpaved road). It can evidently get really windy. We used Tour Guide Ushuaia to make arrangements.

 

(Stanley, Puerto Madryn, and Punta Arenas seemed to be the commonly cited penguin destinations - your itinerary skips Madryn for Chacabuco, it seems, so that may factor. Magdalena seems to be the only viable Arenas penguin option as net research suggests the Seno Otway colony is no longer a destination even though our Port Lecturer suggested it... Estancia Harberton in Ushuaia is also on the list, but it's an independent-only option.)

 

-Ushuaia: Tierra del Fuego National Park seems to be the natural go-to, here - and it is nice - but I do agree that it can be very thick with cruisers in its paths and walkways (and it does apportion time to a coffee stop). A taxi/independent is more able to do things like stop briefly at additional points and/or slow down for some brief photo moments. Do some research on the End of the World train to see if it sounds like something that would feel worthwhile; it was a your-mileage-may-vary for us in research and we were in hindsight glad to have gone for a different option. Our taxi driver also took us out of Ushuaia to see Hidden Lake / Garibaldi Pass - the drive and views were just as to even more memorable, though I don't think that the Princess Museum and Mountain Drive at 139.95 pp is even close to reasonably priced.

 

-Stanley: Volunteer Point. 

 

...If an independent vendor still has space, the savings are worth it (with the trade that you will be responsible for dealing with the tender system). We were very pleased with Estancia Excursions. We paid in GBP. Stanley itself is very compact, though sloping.

 

-Montevideo: The city core was very accessible from where the Star Princess docked. A ship city tour by itself would have been very disappointing; we took the Tour Guide Ushuaia option of City Tour and Barbecue. Our experience was highly satisfying - we thoroughly enjoyed being able to spend time with our tour guide and his family with a backyard picnic (a number of folks in the overall group enjoyed plenty of wine :D).

 

...Sorry, that was rather lengthy. In short: For Princess options, go for nature-oriented and skip the city drives; independent options - well-reviewed and via roll calls, particularly - can save you a lot of money for a comparable, same, or even superior experience (with the trade of being more hands-on for your tender ports).

 

(Bonus: Don't miss the ship sailing through Glacier Alley. It just shows up as a Patter entry and is encountered on the way to Ushuaia. We didn't have a broadcast or notification and there were those that missed the entire passage.)

 

Hope this helps. Happy travels!

Edited January 12, 2019 by Crewbie

[pompeii]

Thrilled to hear about the two excellent ratings for Estancia for Volunteer Point!  I booked with Nyree over Patrick Watts for my SA/Antarctica cruise next January and I'm happy to hear my decision reaffirmed!

[skynight]

Lots of advice. Here is my take.

Excursions.

B.A. - Check out Buenostours.com for private tours. We used them and they did a really nice job. 

Puerto Montt - We turned left out of the gate and walked up into the town. Interesting.

Punta Arenas - The first time we were there we took a long ferry ride, 2 hours each way, over to Madellana Island to see penguins. There are penguins closer, but you have to be there at the proper time to see them. They leave at the same time the cruise season ends. The 2nd time we walked into town, looked around, stopped for hot chocolate at a really nice shop near the city park.

Ushuaia - We took a private tour to the End of the World which included some walking tours along the way. This was arranged through the roll call.

Stanley - It's a small town. Everything is expensive. Patrick's tour is popular. There are also locals right at the pier that shuttle passengers back & forth to Gypsy Cove to see penguins. These are the small penguins, not the kings like at Volunteer Point. There are very few actual roads. The trip to Volunteer Point is over fields.

Montevideo - Last time we took a private tours with tourguideushuaia.net. We took the city tour with backyard BBQ. It was really nice.

You can walk on your own straight up to the city park where there are vendors. Don't carry anything of value, and especially don't hang cameras or purses around your neck. Don't leave the main street.

Credit Cards are widely accepted.

We were in Chile for 4 days. We got cash at an ATM at the airport, and then some additional in the town. Since we took a private tours in Ushuaia and Montevideo we paid in US$, didn't require cash.

When got some ARG Pesos at a blue market exchange. This helped pay for cabs and tips in B.A.

 

[TracieABD]

Here is a link to my blog for that cruise...

Granted, it was in 2013- but many of the tour operators are still in business.

 

Bon voyage!

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/1706521-the-quotno-promisesquot-live-from-star-princess-january-30-2013-round-the-horn/

[ukestrummer]

We have done the 28 day S.A. cruise, a lot of vendors take US funds BUT make sure your bill do not have any kind of mARK on them, Fresh crisper bills also, look close at both sides, also no tears on bills

[skynight]

13 minutes ago, ukestrummer said:

We have done the 28 day S.A. cruise, a lot of vendors take US funds BUT make sure your bill do not have any kind of mark on them, Fresh crisper bills also, look close at both sides, also no tears on bills

ditto this. newer bills, no tears, marks. No large bills. No coins.

[TheRabbit]

4 hours ago, pompeii said:

Thrilled to hear about the two excellent ratings for Estancia for Volunteer Point!  I booked with Nyree over Patrick Watts for my SA/Antarctica cruise next January and I'm happy to hear my decision reaffirmed!

A lot of the experience is spent in the 4x4, so a local driver will give you the local color. Our driver was a child during the Falkland war and had insight into that historic period. All the tours go to the same parking lot, so if one tour company is sold out, look for another.

We are still talking about the tour 3 years later.

[Crewbie]

Good point on reminding on the condition of the bills. Our tour guides did not do any close inspections when we were paying, but they were closely examined when we were purchasing entry tickets for Petrohue Falls. I wasn't able to take a look at what money we had prepared beforehand and was slightly frazzled at how many bills were actually very worn, creased, written on, stamped, stained, and outright torn or with nicks.

 

Bring your own stock of 5s and 1s for tips and smaller usages - we had a number of conversations with other cruisers about how difficult those were to obtain on board (one person received change in 10s... and quarters).

[diane.in.ny]

Several weeks before a trip I start pulling cash out of the bank. I specifically ask for $10s, $5s, and $1s. I sort through them looking for bills that are totally clean and in otherwise good condition. I then take the bills and quickly run a warm iron over them. Crisps them up 🙂

[satxdiver]

We did this cruise a few years ago spending a few days in Santiago and 5 days in BA at the end.  In Santiago and BA we drew cash from a bank money machine as the merchants only took their currency.  They all took VISA etc if you want to go that route.  In ports the shops at the ship all took USD but be careful if they try to give you their currency in change.  All who took USD would not take worn, marked on, torn or bills larger than $20 as all they wanted  were in USD in perfect condition.  

 

We went with Patrick in the Falklands and he was great.  We even were in the 4x4 that he drove!  His tours fill up fast so book early and are less than the ship offers.  They all go to the same place using the same route.  Be aware though that the last 10 or so miles is cross fields that have marsh areas that have to be steered around.  The ride is very bumpy and not good for anyone with back problems.  He like others uses locals with 4x4 vehicles who do it to get extra money as most are ranchers.  

 

Be aware that the Argentinians are still upset over the Falkland war and it is not a good idea to bring up that you just came from or are going to the islands.  Sometimes when the ship arrives in an Argentinian port after last visiting the FI, they harass the ship making it wait to arrive in port and/or unload pax.  Argentina refers to the islands as the Malvinas and believe it belongs to them. 

 

Edited January 15, 2019 by satxdiver

[DougH]

After 75+ cruise the best shore excursion I've been on was Volunteer Point with Patrick Watts. The penguins are amazing, fantastic day and he was 1/2 the cost of the Princess excursion. Get to Volunteer Point any way you can, I would have been happy even with the higher prices. I can't recommend highly enough :)

[TheRabbit]

1 hour ago, DougH said:

After 75+ cruise the best shore excursion I've been on was Volunteer Point with Patrick Watts. The penguins are amazing, fantastic day and he was 1/2 the cost of the Princess excursion. Get to Volunteer Point any way you can, I would have been happy even with the higher prices. I can't recommend highly enough 🙂

Amen.

I think I may have mentioned it was in our top five. We have only done one other tour that may have topped it.

Those 10 plus miles are through bogs and very bumpy. DW was stuck in the middle in the back seat and after the bogs, she was glad she was. Everyone else was a bit sore from bumping the windows. LOL

Part of the fun is seeing the 4x4s who get stuck get pulled out.

[DougH]

22 hours ago, TheRabbit said:

Amen.

I think I may have mentioned it was in our top five. We have only done one other tour that may have topped it.

Those 10 plus miles are through bogs and very bumpy. DW was stuck in the middle in the back seat and after the bogs, she was glad she was. Everyone else was a bit sore from bumping the windows. LOL

Part of the fun is seeing the 4x4s who get stuck get pulled out.

The driver I had was the local ambulance driver normally. He was the oldest and slowest but we magically were always the first at any stopping point. The younger drivers would speed past us only to be stopped by gates or which route to take. Our guy knew how many gates were coming up so he never had to get out to open any. If the lead cars got stuck everyone would get out and discuss how to get around. We would sit patiently until they decided but most of the time he got tired of waiting and just drove around the obstacle on a route no one else seemed to see. LOL

[indyrocks]

Many, many thanks to all of you who replied! You gave us a load of information to sift through.