SouthAmerica.travel IncReviews of southamerica.travel

I needed to stay on top of matters since there were flight changes that I needed to alert them to. Once there, a couple of the tours were not as stated and we had an issue with being told that our meals were not included at a hotel (even though the voucher said otherwise) and it took almost an hour to resolve.

overall good experience in Peru. SA agent could have been more knowledgeable in setting up iitinereary.Some hotels not as good as expected. no response for an itinerary segment refund request. some excursions rushed.

It is too early to write review, not yet finalized all the itinerary, to be fair, ask me again 2 weeks later. regards, BERT

Our tours, driver and guide were wonderful in Medellin but no one picked us up at the airport in Cartagena. We took a cab and met our guide there. We had 8 hour city tour and it was a bit long. Going to the mud bath was about a 2 hour tour. Glad it was short not that interesting. Would suggest Rosario Islands. Chiva bus tour was a lot of waiting around to pick up people and all in Spanish. Our guide in Bogota was 30 min. late and we waited another 20 Min for are driver which made us 1 hour for our cooking class which was wonderful even though we missed most of market tour due to being late. Our guide in Bogota barely spoke English and never barely or could answer our questions. I felt all is what we needed was a driver there and we could do the rest on our own. As you see some highs but also lows!

Staff was very responsive and friendly. However, I did have some difficulty with making hotel arrangements. After making my 20% down payment, I was informed the hotels I had selected were no longer available. Typically this would not be a big reason for concern, but the trip was advertised as an Eco trip in which you would stay at local estancias, which included all meals and horseback riding at one of the locations. No comperable alternatives were available. Fortunately, the travel agent I worked with was able to move dates around so that we could still stay at one of the estancias. However, i was charged additional fees in order to accommodate necessary transportation back to the airport. To me, this was a bit of a poor experience as any changes in hotels/fees should have been confirmed before accepting down payment was accepted.

Generally very responsive with changes and updates dealt with speedily but the attention to detail perhaps a little lacking. These reviews should really be after the trip - it is more important to know that you are looked after whilst overseas.

The trip was very organized but it's not what I had in mind. The main reason for me to book my recent trip for the carnival in Rio through south America travel was because I wanted to be with a group of travellers since I'm a female traveling alone. After communication with an agent, who's to be fair very responsive, I was assured that I'll be with a group and so I booked my trip. When I decided to extend my stay and started looking at hotels I discovered that the price I paid for the 4 stars hotels booked for my trip could have qualified me to stay at 5 stars hotel. I wrote to the agent to inform him and I was told that the price of hotels only is not enough to estimate what the trip in total cost. Since I had already paid in full there was no point for me to argue. To my greatest surprise though, the first night I arrived in Rio I realized that I wasn't part of any group taking the same itinerary. Apparently the services of your agency was only to organize accommodation and tours with other local agencies with the transfer between hotels and airpor. Something that I could have easily done myself with a price much less than what I've paid. I would have also appreciated an advice to travel to iguazo from rio on any day other than ash Wednesday since I ended up paying 10 times more than a normal ticket costs cuz it was on of the busiest days of the year.

My wife and I are used to tours being adjusted to meet transport or weather problems and the local agent usually finds a way to provide the holiday expected. Whilst this was mainly the case, there was one item which caused us to be waiting at an airport due to South America Travel planning and communication problems. Our itinerary included a flight from Santa Cruz to La Paz at 1.00pm on Tuesday 6th May with Amaszonas Linea Aerea. I checked this before we left but could not see a flight departure time of 1.00pm for that day on the airline website, but there was a flight at 10.20am, so to be sure, I emailed South America Travel who replied that it was confirmed. However, on 1 May a travel schedule change notification was emailed saying that the flight was now at 10.20 am, but the only e-ticket we had said 1.00pm. The Santa Cruz agent said we were being taken to the airport for a 1.00 pm flight. At the airport, we learned that there was indeed no 1.00pm flight and that the airline had put us on a 7.30pm flight. We waited at the airport for an additional 6.5 hours. At La Paz, the agent said he had gone to the airport expecting us to be on the 10.20am flight! Also, he said that he had enquired and the airline told him that we were never listed on the 10.20am airline passenger list. We received no apology or explanation from South America Travel.