In January 2015, we visited four countries: Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile. From China we were meant to land in São Paulo, but ended up in Rio de Janeiro instead, where we mainly enjoyed Brazilian food. The highlight of Brazil was without a doubt Costa Verde, although the tour of Rio de Janeiro was very nice too.
After getting our card cloned in Rio, we went to the magnificent Iguazú Falls, after we headed down for some tango & wine in Buenos Aires. From there, we took a ferry to Uruguay. We ended the month by flying south towards the end of the world: Patagonia. There, we spent time in both Argentina and Chile.
The overview below lists the expenses in Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay. For Argentina, the expenses up until February 4 are included, as this gives the full picture of the expenses. For Chile, we will cover all expenses in next months’ recap.
The Good
- We didn’t spent much the first two days in Brazil, as we got stuck in Rio de Janeiro. The hotel the airline put us in provided and excellent look into typical Brazilian foods, however, which was a welcome surprise.
- As our card got cloned, we had to strictly limit our spending to avoid running out of money for things we really wanted to do. In the end, this lead to a lot of extra savings.
- Due to the poor state of the Argentinian economy, we were able to get around 50% more Argentinian pesos on the black market than the official exchange rate indicates. More on this here.
The Bad
- We were stuck with two weeks of laundry when arriving in Ilha Grande. Unfortunately, it was not cheap to do laundry on the island: it cost us a whopping 25$.
- As our card got cloned, we had to resort to a card which has hefty ATM fees, spending a total of 78$ on fees on five (albeit large) withdrawals.
- In Argentina, restaurants often add a 2$ to 3$ mandatory cubierto charge. This charge is added for using the restaurants’ silverware. If you get a drink, the charge is made twice as a glass is counted as additional silverware. This happened once, but cost us 7$.
A detailed list of expenses per country is listed below. The amounts per person are based on our two-person journey. Flights are listed separately (and are not included in the countries’ budget) as we booked these in advance.
Flights
- Beijing to São Paulo: $1,283 ($641.50 pp) on Etihad Airways,
- Rio de Janeiro to Foz do Iguaçu: $171 ($85.50 pp) on GOL,
- Puerto Iguazú to Buenos Aires & Buenos Aires to El Calafate: $734 ($367 pp) on LAN Airlines.
Brazil
- Days: 14,
- Budget: $1,960 ($70 pppd),
- Expenses: $1,347 ($48 pppd),
- Additional visa costs: $160 (Herta).
Argentina & Uruguay
Note (1): Uruguay accepts the Argentinian Peso and U.S. Dollar, therefore we decided to add the money spent during our one-day trip to Uruguay to the Argentina budget.
Note (2): the miscellaneous expenses yield a large, negative number. This is due to the black market exchange rate of U.S. Dollars in Argentina. More on this here.
- Days: 12,
- Budget: $1,440 ($60 pppd),
- Expenses: $1,547 ($64.50 pppd),
- Additional visa costs: $160 (Herta).
Next Month
The first few days of February we will spend in Chilean Patagonia, before heading back north. We will spent more time in Chile there, and depending on how our plans enfold we might go to Argentina a bit more before crossing into Bolivia. For our one-year anniversary (February 12th), we have something special planned – you will see.
