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Testimonials

Please have a look at a little of the feedback we have received from clients over the years...

Here at South America we firmly believe in the feedback of our clients, be it good or bad, as it really is the key to us moving forwards and improving our service and the overall experience. With the price of hotels and flights only on the increase we feel it is important to know where we have gotten things right and where wrong. In the below, please see what our clients are saying about us and judge for yourself. (please note that ALL of the reviews we feature are 100% real and unedited. If you would like to speak to any of our past clients please let us know).

Furthermore, we have started to gather customer reviews through Trustpilot so please take a look at our page on there to see how we are doing. Trustpilot Reviews >>

Hi Nick

All the hotels were fine, I suppose Patagonia Camp was the highlight. Legado Mitico in Salta, a friend 's recommendation, was a lovely building and large rooms, the staff were nice but a little dreamy! Classico in BA was great. Staff at VInas Cafayate, as I said earlier, were very helpful and a nice property. Esplendor in Calafate was a larger type hotel but lovely large rooms, all fine there. Club Tapiz outside Mendoza was good too, nice people, interesting wine tastings, people tended to eat just once in their restaurant though it was good. The whole trip ran like clockwork!

When I get back to France and my Mac I will sort out photos.

Thanks again for everything.
Jackie

Jackie
February 2, 2018

Hi Nick

We were very happy with all the hotel selections except one: Alto Calafate seemed a cut below the rest. When we went on the Perito Moreno tour, the bus stopped at a couple of places that seemed nicer and closer to town. But it was not a major issue by any means.

Salta City was interesting and Legado Mitico was great but I would have preferred staying at Finca Valentina and coming into town to check it out rather than staying in town. But there again, that may just be our individual preference.

In general, we were super pleased with the itinerary and have already recommended your company to friends.

Thanks and regards

Joe

Joe
February 1, 2018

Hi Nick

I just want to say a huge thank you for helping me sort out my trip to Antarctica it was truly magical, amazing, and wonderful there's not really enough words to describe it.

Thanks,
Karen

Karen
January 31, 2018

Hi Nick and Holly,

Happy new year!

Thank you for arranging our trip to Antarctica. We had a great time and everything exceeded our expectations!

Here’s a few photos from our trip.

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Terence
December 17, 2017

Hi Holly, On my way back thought I’d share my take on the trip with you. At the outset we had a great time so thanks for your inputs! On each of the respective properties we stayed at : Rio —Miramar was nothing to complain about nor rave about, well located tho and whilst not a wow property, met all our needs. Atacama— Was the best of the properties we stayed at on most fronts. Size and quality of the room, service and attention to detail we are all impeccable. The only area that could have been better was the guiding, on actually, only one of the excursions, the one to the geysers. The rest were all good. Food was a bit of an issue, but to be fair we experience similar issues regardless of the reputation of the properties we’ve stayed at. I guess our food preferences are not a critically sized market just as yet. The endeavour to assist was in place though. Santiago—- More than satisfied with the Ritz for the short time we were there. Patagonia— The place & it’s location were truly awe inspiring! Room size and attention to details a bit patchy— excursions nice enough in terms of guiding and in terms of where we went —well awesome! Had a bit of a food issue—were served a dessert that contained egg, despite multiple clarifications sought by us. We discovered the same when we were informed about the same the next day by another server. The manager, Eduardo ( he had the right attitude) sat us down with the chef and subsequently ensured the rest of our meals were incident free! Also quality improved meaningfully too which always leads me to think folks like us aren’t so difficult to please but are not large enough a market size. Eolo- was lovely! A class act! And the glacier-well words as you might agree, inadequate! The excursion too turned out a perfect fit for us. Buenos Aires—-Happy with the hotel, the ambience, room quality and size, location as well as service . So I all we’ve had a great trip, so thanks. If we can help it this won’t be our last trip to the continent so expect to hear from us! Cheers and all the very best, regards, Deepak

Deepak and Simmi
December 14, 2017

Hi Holly and Nick

Just wanted to give you some feedback about our trip.

We had the most incredible time!

The Argentina Specialists supplied us with a whatsapp number that was invaluable and they were absolutely brilliant. Always turning up when they were supposed to on time and were very informative. I spoke to one of the tour guides and said they were the best people around and when our flight was delayed by 4 hours, and we went out on a tour and had no wifi, they liaised with the person taking our tour and she said none of the other agencies would have tried to find us another flight.

The whole thing was organised brilliantly by yourselves and the detailed itinerary was incredibly helpful.

BA – We loved the hotel, they were so friendly and couldn’t do enough to help.
PM – We were extremely lucky and saw whales, which actually kept coming up to the boat. Hotel was a little far out and the aircon didn’t work and they couldn’t get it working and weren’t overly helpful. It was a slightly unusual but modern hotel with an excellent breakfast!
EL C – The glacier trip was incredible, and the hotel was up the top of a hill, it also had no aircon, in the whole hotel, which wasn’t ideal as our room was really hot, but the place was nice.
SM LA – Great little place, a real find, they couldn’t do enough to help us. We all loved it. The only issue was the car, worth suggesting if people want a sat nav (which we did separately and just an FYI there are sign posts for SM LA that take you down a VERY stony/cobbley dirt track which we unfortunately took! The scenery was incredible but It was the longest 70km of my life and there were some hairy bends on the cliff tops! Also when we took out the car, they told us we were only insured for one driver, where you said there was no charge for the second one – I later managed to find the email where you mentioned it, Also, when we returned the car, they tried to tell us we only were covered for 600km, but bearing in mind it was about 400km there and back to the hotel, it wasn’t ideal and luckily both my kids speak excellent Spanish so we managed to get them to waive it.
IG – The hotel was a bit more basic than I had expected and there was no wifi in the room, but the day trips were unbelievable. Unfortunately, we had the long delay at the end, but The Argentina Specialists were brilliant.
BA – Back to the Fierro, My son’s flight was delayed by 24 hours and the hotel were lovely as they hadn’t changed us from a triple to a twin, so he came back for a night and then The Argentina Specialist just organised another cab for him to go back to the airport the next day.

It was a trip of a lifetime and it was very reassuring to know we had a reliable back up. I will absolutely recommend you to anyone I know who is going in the future.

I had been recommended other tour operators, but went with my gut with you guys and I am so pleased I did.

Thank you!

Wishing you a Merry Xmas and Happy New Year.

Kind regards

Suzanne

Suzanne and family
December 6, 2017

Hi Holly,

On behalf of my Friends, I would like to sincerely thank you for organizing our Chile tour. The trip was fantastic and we enjoyed the warm welcome of people, the culture and mostly the verities of the country's landscapes. We also would like to thank TravelArt for making our tour comfortable and pleasant and for providing us with tour guides who are knowledgeable, informative and helpful. I would also like to thank Nick for his assistance.

Regards,

Salem

Salem and group
December 3, 2017

Dear Nick

I wanted to thank you again for an amazing journey.

I am sorry I had not reached out since our return. But I did put in a review on Trust Pilot today.

Really everything worked out to the T

My mind is filled with images of Colome, Salta, Atacama and I wear my ponchos on those cold California nights ( ok there are few of those).

I highly recommend the Turrell museum on the Colome estancia Winery grounds. We even got a private tour from Donald Hess the owner/ world famous art collector who happened to be there the day we went to Seclantas searching for our poncho weavers. Seclantas was a treat for people into Loom Weaving. However that road is a treacherous and dangerous: many narrow portions, on edge of cliffs with trucks driving recklessly around curves. I am glad we decided not to drive from Salta to Cafayate through the Park of the Cardones, it would have taken 10 + hours of dust/rocks and deadly curves lol .

The shorted 5-6 hours from Cafayate to Seclantas was enough for me. but the state park you cross on the way is spectacular --> Quebrada de las Flechas Salta province was well worth the headache and high altitude, beautiful tour to Saline Flats ( bit long in one day but headache was shorter lol) The drive from Salta to Cafayate was spectacular. We stopped so many times that the 3 1/2 hour drive took us 6 hours. But Amazing pictures and gorgeous skies, red rock formations and cacti fill my mind .

Atacama was all that and more. The hotel was perfect; the service and food were all great. Excursions super fun, and glad we trekked all the way to that bright recess of the planet.

Santiago was fine as a city. Luciano K hotel was perfect for the night. The Anthropology museum in Town was a treat. I recommend trying Peumayen Restaurant regional cuisine near Luciano K super tasty.

Valparaiso initially did not appeal, the drive in goes through really depressing run down areas. But once we settled in Hotel Zero with amazing staff/owner we discovered the fun side of the city; Graffiti tour, cerros stairways, art galleries and yes a poncho store with amazing work.

Matetic vineyard was lovely, dinner amazing, sampled their many wines. Incidentally, Tierra Atacama used their wine for house wine, so we were familiar with them by then Weather was foggy and cool but the property looks to be spectacular with sun.

Anyway Thank you Again

Cyril and Brent

Cyril and Brent
November 24, 2017

Hi Holly, Coby and I are just back from a long ride back to El Calafate from the EcoCamp. I must say that everything about the EcoCamp exceeded our wildest dreams and we had a wonderful time indeed. It helped, of course, that we had perfect weather, minimal wind, sunny skies and no rain. We were lucky indeed, as a few days before that, weather was not so good. The only glitch in the entire trip was some anxiety about our pickup at the hotel for our departure. But it all worked out fine - it seemed the driver might have forgotten, as he was very rushed. Everything was flawless from there on. Well, I suppose one could grumble about the long delay at the border, and fortunately you had advised us that such delays are possible. We now feel very glad that we took your advice to book our last leg of the trip to Bariloche for tomorrow. As it happened, someone switched their bus ticket with another person, so the assigned rider wasn’t on the bus driver’s list. That led to all sorts of confusion and delays, but we made it. All’s well that ends well. It is so good to be off the grid and just soaking up the spectacular environment. Time seems to melt into something amorphous and one just enjoys each moment. The people, without exception, at the EcoCamp are excellent. They treat their visitors wonderfully, take very good care of us and meet our every wish. I would give a special shout out to the guides who really make the various excursions special. I developed a cold yesterday, so had very little energy for our last “soft” trek, but our guide was patient and unbothered by my slow pace. The guides share some of their detailed knowledge and understanding of the environment we’re in as well as their deep affection for Patagonia. It has all been a wonderful experience and on we’ll relive over and over. Thanks again for everything you did to make it perfect! Best, Joyce (and Coby!)

Joyce and Coby
November 8, 2017

Nick, Holly Thank you for making the arrangements for our wonderful visit to Brazil which we have just completed. The guide, Marcelo, provided in Rio was excellent, advising us on how to make best use of our other two free days as well as providing a good introduction to the city. We then travelled to Christallino lodge which provided first class accommodation and service for our visit to the Amazon. Barra Mansa was the place we enjoyed the most. It was, I guess, the most authentic establishment- a working farm which also catered for tourists. The conditions were challenging at the lodge given the rudimentary air conditioning and the fact that whilst we were there the temperatures were well over 40 in the heat of the day. The accommodation is clean but not luxurious and the owners and staff both helpful and friendly (albeit with limited English - but that did not matter at all). The activities on offer included walks, canoeing, horse riding, motor boat and vehicle safaris. We were with a private guide, Victor do Nacimento, who as we found out had a terrific reputation not only at Barra Mansa but also at Caiman- and with good reason. Please thank who ever selected him because his knowledge, hard work and experience matched anything we have had from a guide anywhere in the world. So onto the Caiman Lodge which provided first class accommodation with good staff and good guides. We did see jaguar (at both Barra Mansa - a rare sight- and Caiman. The trip to the Iguacu Falls went well, the guide showed us the Argentine side, and it provided a perfect end to a great holiday. Certainly the extraordinary high temperatures made this a challenging holiday but the sight, sound and the people of Brazil made it a really enjoyable and worthwhile visit. Thank you for support, organisation and help in making the trip possible. Also thank you for airport lounge in Rio as this made very long trip home more bearable. David and Linda


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David and Linda
October 13, 2017

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