50 miles (80km) from Perito Moreno, the city of El Calafate, Argentina pales in comparison to the attraction that fills its hotels and restaurants with tourists and serves as not much more than a comfortable base for the many tourist attractions and activities in the area. We booked a tour immediately upon arrival and headed out early the next morning in the white tourist van toward the ever-present Andes Mountains.

An hour later we arrived at  Los Glaciares National Park and stopped at the first viewpoint of the glacier. Being able to see so much ice from so far away made us realize just how massive this field of ice is: roughly 18 miles (29 km) long and three miles (5 km) wide, and at its tallest point, reaching over 240ft (73m) out of the water – as tall as a 20-story building! We wouldn’t be able to grasp all of that information from this distance just yet.

The van pulled in to a marina for one of two major parts of the tour, an hour-long boat ride to get within 200m of the end of the glacier. While it was already fairly warm when we boarded at 10am, just ten minutes into the ride we were already starting to freeze as we neared the glacier. The boat finally stopped in front of this incredible wall of ice and the temperature dropped shockingly low.
There we stood, wrapped in jackets, scarves, clutching our cameras with frozen hands, floating in front of a field of ice that is 97 square miles (250km2) and the 240 feet of ice above water is literally only the icing on the cake, as the sheet of ice actually reaches 2,297 feet at its deepest points.

Although we now stood close enough to feel the true size of the freezing, gargantuan glacier, we could have actually trekked right across it on a more intense (and much more expensive) type of tour. Instead we opted to spend the day on the miles and miles of viewing platforms that zig-zag up and down the side of the hill just across the water, facing the glacier. As we stood there taking it all in, several groups of ice trekkers looked surreal, the size of ants, as they crunched their way across the permafrost of the ice field in front of us.

The boat ride is a must-do, but we could have spent the whole day traversing the walkways. At first I wondered how long you could possibly want to stare at a big chunk of ice, but there is nothing else like it in the world. The glacier is like a living, breathing being.
It moves two meters a day, and is actually growing in size. As the heat of the sun warms up the glacier’s edge, more and more giant blocks of ice fall off splashing into the water. The process, called calving, creates endless entertainment, as each deep blue piece that falls, though tiny from afar, ranges in size from a small car to a small building.

The waves from the fall move outward and back in again, which carves out a tunnel beneath the glacier a bit at a time. As the tunnel deepens, it undermines the stability of the tunnel, water flowing deeper underneath until, every once in a while, a massive piece of ice bursts off the end of the glacier.

Even when small ice cubes plop in to the water, the cracking sound is so loud we can hear it from any part of the viewing platform. When the pieces are bigger, the sound is so humbling that the most animalistic part of you is instinctively reminded just how small your place on earth really is.

Chunks of ice that could have taken down the Titanic float in front of the glacier in the lake, melting ever so slowly in the freezing cold water.

Although it seems counter-intuitive, the chunks calve off the glacier because it is one of the few in Patagonia that is constantly growing every day, and as it expands those 30-odd kilometers in the back, small chunks break off in the front.

We wondered why the ice was blue and thought it was temperature related. On the contrary, it is related to age – the bluer the ice, the older the part of the glacier.

What makes Perito Moreno all the more impressive is that it actually belongs to the Southern Patagonian Ice Field (shared between Chile and Argentina) that feeds in to a total of 48 glaciers and makes the world’s largest fresh water reserve.

A GlobetrotterGirls Day Trip

Come with us on a quick trip out to the glacier in this short clip of the Perito Moreno Glacer experience:

How to visit Perito Moreno Glacier

Several tour agencies in El Calafate offer tours to the glacier. There are three types:

1) The basic option with only the walkways- no boat
2) The walkways plus a boat tour
3) Ice trekking on the glacier.

Our friends from Indefinite Adventure had visited the glacier just before us and had found that MundoAustral offers the best prices (ARS$180/US$35 for the basic tour or ARS$230/US$45 incl. the boat ride) and we couldn’t find a tour operator that was able to beat that price.

Note: The entrance fee to the park, ARS$130/US$25 as of 1 March 2013, is not included in any of the tours.You can also take a public bus to the park, which leaves from El Calafate at 8.00am and returns from the park at 4.00pm. Return tickets are ARS$145/US$28. The boat trip can be booked in the park for ARS90/US$17. Ice climbing is offered by several tour operators in El Calafate and starts at around ARS$600/US$115.

Tip: We recommend taking a complete tour to the park, at least if you are planning to take the boat trip. We paid ARS$230 for our package – transport to and from the park, plus the boat tour booked separately, would cost ARS$235, and with the tour you get explanations from professional tour guides, plus you stop at several locations inside and outside the park, and get hotel pick up and drop off.

Food: There is a cafeteria inside the park, but the food is mediocre at best (sandwiches and chips) and incredibly overpriced. Bring your own lunch and eat it while gazing at the glacier.

Where to stay: 

We stayed at the Del Glaciar Libertador Hostel & Suites for which we found a special deal on Booking.com (US$60 for a double room with private bathroom incl. breakfast, 20 % cheaper than stated on the hostel website).

Ice, Ice Baby: The amazing Perito Moreno Glacier | Patagonia, Argentina is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

The beauty of New York is that you can get almost anything from anywhere around the world. For us, this means that all of the knowledge, experiences, smells, tastes, flavors, cultures we have experienced in the last three years of travel and the ten years of life abroad before that all converge here, in one place.

Yet this is exactly what is causing me apparently quite a bit of stress. Not stress like the people in Muang Ngoi Neua in Laos who had to hide in caves for a decade during the Vietnam War, scaling down a mountainside under the cover of darkness just to tend to crops just to survive.

No, these are total #firstworldproblems - tiny, nearly invisible stressors. The ones that go unnoticed, like those 1KB files that save onto your hard-drive. Slowly, the small stressors start to add up, kilobytes turn into MB, MB into GB and then possibly, these gigs turn into terabytes, though this is a number that is still too big for me to wrap my head around. Let me explain.

It all started at the Brooklyn Flea

Yesterday we went to the Brooklyn Flea, a fun flea market with a mix of stands selling everything from original hand crafted T-shirts and retro furniture to giant pink elephants and boxes of Garbage Pail Kids, all surrounded by food vendors selling food from around the world.

So there we are, soaking it all up, enjoying from two perspectives: the first because we love flea markets like this, just like all our fellow 30-something hipster-leaning flea visitors and the second from the outside perspective, how happy we are to be in a place that has such clever products, delicious and healthy food – and be able to be on the side of those who can afford such things.

Fair trade feels good, unless…

We saunter past a stand selling fair trade organic chocolate made in Africa for $7 a bar, and that little bit of stress starts downloading. The health-conscious side of me that loves the idea of organic 70% cacao wrestles with the part of me that has seen these ‘fair trade’ farms in action. The latter wins, annoyed at the fact that my fellow flea market shoppers who will buy this chocolate will simply think they have killed two birds with one stone – having scored organic chocolate and helped people in Africa all in one day.

Let me tell you, in the last three years, we have toured coffee plantations in Central America, salt fields and pepper farms in Cambodia and tea plantations in Malaysia and make no mistake, this isn’t like strolling through a vineyard in the Napa Valley. These people are working a ridiculous amount of hours for ‘fair’ pay, a subjective, relative term far from being enough to earn them a middle class living that the people who actually purchase this chocolate would actually consider ‘fair’.

Salt field workers in Cambodia

Ralph Waldo Emerson eloquently said, “The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions.” 

I can’t un-see something, un-know someone, un-do what’s been done and this knowledge forms the lens through which I experience the world, one I wear like Google Glass, interpreting the present as I travel onward. But I am finding that wrestling with the conflict between my knowledge and my actions.

Too much food for thought might be a slippery slope

You might remember way back when I was wondering if I would ever get healthy on the road. Since then I have begun to really inform myself and have made massive strides, especially since my cow incident in India, to get my health and fitness back on track. Armed with the knowledge, I have had the power to change and yet I am also armed with knowledge gained by experience of just how privileged it is to be able to afford these luxuries and then again how annoying it is that I can’t just be sure that average, everyday food at the local supermarket is as healthy and nutrient-dense as it should be. Take milk.

The stand next to the chocolate stand at the Brooklyn Flea was a guy selling nut milk. Three years ago, I’d have scoffed at a guy in a lumberjack shirt and beard selling ‘milk’ of nuts, but after traveling and learning from others just how unhealthy our milk is, stuffed with antibiotics and hormones illegal in other countries, I’m actually happy to see him selling his almond milk and I want to buy some myself.

Of course, somewhere in the background, my system is downloading those kilobytes of stress by my anger with big food and the confusion I feel about being able to drink something so ‘natural’ like milk. Or water! The U.S. (and Canada) adds fluoride to the water for healthy teeth and bones, while European countries (along with most of Oregon) outlaw it because it causes bone decay and other horrific diseases.

Which is right?

Can I drink the water?

How bad is milk for me really?

No one expresses my inner rage about this like comedian Lewis Black, in this hilarious bit on Milk and Water.

As a part of my intensifying health kick, one thing I was ecstatic about for our time in New York was super healthy Kerrygold grass-fed butter. Happy cows, hormone/antibiotic free…all made in Ireland. Can’t go wrong with that, right? Upon doing more research, I discovered a clip by yet another happy bearded white guy, (cleverly titled Kerrygold’s Mooovin to Africa) explaining how Kerrygold will be helping the local African communities by relocating there. And here we go again. Let the wrestling match begin between my knowledge of nutrition and desire to eat healthily and my understanding of the on-the-ground realities behind do-gooder marketing.

Are we  causing malnutrition by eating this health food?

The worst conflict for both Dani and I, however, has been our love and guilt surrounding quinoa, a South American grain packed so tight with protein, magnesium, iron and fiber it has been credited by academics for the rise to power of the Incas. Forbes called it the ‘Superfood of the Future’. I imagined how healthy we would be filling up on quinoa throughout South America, but it turned out to be pretty hard to get our hands on. When I researched why we weren’t finding barrels of it spilling over at markets everywhere, I came across headlines like ‘How Many Bolivians are Dying Because Foodies Love Quinoa?’ and dozens of articles asking whether it is even ethical for consumers outside of South America to eat quinoa and whether our consumption is causing malnutrition in Bolivia and Peru. Essentially, the supply of this super food is being cultivated almost entirely for export only and prices are now so high that the locals can not afford the food that has been sustaining them for a millennium.

Quinoa Salad at Quinoa restaurant in upscale Vitacura neighborhood |Santiago, Chile

Does that keep me from eating quinoa? No. Before we flew to New York we picked up a kilo of quinoa from a local market in Chile, but I’ve also ordered it in restaurants as it is often the healthiest food choice on the menu.

Will anything ever feel purely good again? 

This isn’t all about food. When we try on $30 jeans at Target that were made in Cambodia, for us the country isn’t just a far-away place to be silently ignored on the tag of our jeans. Cambodia we visited where the smiles of the people melted our hearts, a place where we cried inconsolably at the injustice of the Khmer Rouge and were inspired by how noble the people are rather than hating us for our countries’ lack of involvement in ending the genocide. But we buy these jeans, made in Cambodia, knowing they don’t get a truly fair wage to make them. These jeans fit better than ones sold in Latin America, and also we don’t want to spend $100 on the ones that are handmade for sale at places like the Brooklyn Flea. After all, our funds go to traveling the world, to further feed these neuroses (wink wink).

The other day I came across an article about an amazing organization here called Badass Brooklyn, a local dog shelter “saving badass dogs from idiot humans”. They rescue dogs from inhumane kill shelters in several southern U.S. states, placing them with a wide network of foster families before finding them permanent homes. And yet, rather than just feeling happy at the purity of these badasses, a big part of me actually feels sad, intensely sad thinking about stray dogs in Central America or South East Asia, who are treated so poorly it breaks our hearts on a daily basis while we are there.

And yet, these street dogs exist because they don’t have kill shelters, where dogs are killed if no one adopts them after a month or so. An Argentine pointed that out to me recently, and I realized that we don’t have dogs on the street because so many are just put to death instead. So who is right?

I constantly take what should be little moments of happiness – like finding a pair of $30 jeans that fit, reading about the badasses or being able to flush toilet paper down the toilet, and contradict them with something I have learned at some point on the road. The thoughts come and go in a split second, just a few KB of stress download, but it all adds up thought after thought, day after day.

There are genuinely good people who will just buy that $7 bar of fair trade chocolate, or a dozen to give to friends and family, and then grab a bottle of almond milk to wash that sweetness down. They will experience no conflict, their souls at ease.

But not me, at least not yet. The more I travel the world, the harder it is to reconcile my own role within it.

What’s the takeaway?

Would I give up a lifestyle of travel just to avoid the constant, neurotic voice inside? Absolutely not!

Because it is this discomfort, this inner conflict back on my own turf, these are some of the true lessons that travel offers to its most diligent students. What a holidaymaker absorbs from a trip to Cancun for spring break is a love of an ‘authentic’ hot sauce and a new Winsin y Yandel CD.

What I wonder is, if our task as travelers is to learn to navigate through these neuroses and emotional conflicts, how many of us can take these gigabytes of stored stress energy and create, teach, produce something meaningful from it all…?

What do you think? Am I just completely neurotic or do you have similar thoughts after periods of long-term travel?

What I Wonder When I Wander: If knowledge is power, then why is travel weakening me with neuroses? is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

The greatest thing about our housesit in New York, however, is that it gives us almost eight weeks to explore every buttery nook and cranny of the Big Apple and still have time to recover from the blinding speed of our tour through all of Chile, Argentina and Uruguay.

We’ve been to New York before, both times only for a few days and raced to fit in as many quintessential sights as possible. Not this time. Now, instead of making a trip to see the Brooklyn Bridge, I jog over it and back to Brooklyn via the Manhattan Bridge. Now, if we don’t get a good picture of the skyline at sunset, we just come back the next night and try again. Now, whenever we pass by a cafe restaurant, bagel shop or farmers market, it’s not just a part of the scenery of New York life – we can pop in any time and try it out ourselves sometime later that week.

Just a few weeks ago we were hiking through the driest desert in the world, short of breath from the altitude, strolling past pink flamingos on the salt flats, and now we stroll aimlessly through the neighborhoods of New York, we work at trendy cafes with delicious Flat Whites, eat breakfast at the diner on the corner and watch nannies pushing strollers, hipsters, bankers, students, delivery people and yes, some tourists, navigate the sidewalks and subways together. We could have never soaked up true New York life while lined up to hop a boat out to the Statue of Liberty or waiting for a trip up the Empire State building. This is just one reason of many why we love housesitting!

Polaroid of the week: Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan skyline is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

We’re back with the third edition of the Break Free podcast!

Session 003 is an interview with fellow travelers Tracy and Della, a British couple who run Chez Vous Sitters, a professional housesitting business that has kept them living rent-free and making money on top of it for over seven years now. There are few who are such housesitting pros as these two women, and hearing that they are in agreement with almost every single piece of advice and experience that we share in our own housesitting book was a great support. The interview is inspiring as yet another way that someone can live a life with a balance of life and travel, and also includes highlights and a couple of inevitable lowlights in their unconventional profession.

This is also Dani’s first time on the mic, leading the conversation!

Links mentioned in the podcast:

Chez Vous Professional Pet and Housesitting Service
Globetrottergirls.com
Break Free: The Ultimate Guide to Housesitting 

Break Free Session 003: How Tracy and Della of Chez Vous Sitters live as professional housesitters is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

We spent six weeks traveling down from Valparaiso, Chile south through Patagonia to the southernmost tip of the Americas, and it took us just under four hours to fly back up and into Uruguay’s capital, Montevideo. Wildlife was suddenly replaced by city life and we couldn’t wait to soak up the hustle, and its partner bustle. What we really needed, however, was a good rest after weeks of overpriced, grungy youth hostels, the only accommodation available – for the most part – for under $50 a night in the region.

We were desperate for a grown-up place to stay with all the amenities and comforts of home at a fair price.

That’s exactly what we got with Posada al Sur, in Montevideo’s Ciudad Vieja neighborhood.

The area itself is not the best, as much of Montevideo has gotten a bit rougher in recent years. The street the posada is located on is particularly dark at night and look out in a couple of weeks for a She Said, She Said post on our attempted robbery experience in Montevideo (don’t worry, they got nothing and we made a huge scene!).

Once inside the Posada, however, our cares melted away. Posada al Sur is exactly the kind of hotel we appreciate for its balance of functionality, cleanliness, design and wallet-friendliness.

Set inside two neighboring renovated colonial buildings, the high ceilings make the property feel particularly spacious, and we loved the original high wooden doors and window frames, plus Spanish tile work. We checked in first at reception, set in one building along with a new dormitory room with several beds. Most of the action takes place, however, in the other building next door. There is an entirely separate entrance opening onto a flight of marble stairs. The second floor has five rooms, four private (one en suite) and one spacious dorm room with six beds. The rooms, along with a common room and kitchen, all open to the center of the classic colonial building, where an iron spiral staircase leads up to a rooftop area and separate apartment, fit for a family of four.

Our room was spacious, with one queen mattress as well as a single bed, plus a desk and a large open set of shelves – with three warm blankets for the chilly autumn weather that had just started to settle in during our stay in March. Because the room opens into the building, it stays dark in the mornings with no window for natural light, but because sound tends to carry (as in all colonial-style houses) we could always hear when folks started stirring in the kitchen around breakfast time.

Breakfast at Posada al Sur is easily one of the best we came across in Argentina/Chile/Uruguay thanks to fresh bread, organic honey, delicious fresh jams (and the ubiquitous dulce de leche spread), plus fresh fruit, an actual coffee maker with freshly brewed filter coffee, all laid out on the family-sized wooden table where up to 8 guests at a time can eat together – until the comfortably late time of 11am.
The kitchen itself is really well-equipped, including plenty of dishes, pots, pans and utensils, and a large, clean fridge to store groceries. We cooked several meals here during our stay, and being able to relax in the early afternoon with wine and cheese or coffee and sweets felt like having a home away from home. Even if you are like us and prefer to prepare your own meals while traveling, make sure to stop in at Jacinto, a cozy upscale restaurant just a couple of blocks north of the hotel with sophisticated yet simple meals.

With the exception of the en-suite corner room, guests share the three toilet and shower rooms tucked on the side of the 2nd floor, which were clean and bright and it felt more like using a friend’s washroom than a shared hotel bathroom and plenty of hot water no matter when we showered.

The common room is large with two heavy wooden doors that open out onto small balconies overlooking the street and Ciudad Vieja. This was great for people-watching from above, and certainly here in the afternoons could have felt very romantic – unfortunately this room is not as comfortable as it could be. There are two computers with internet in the corner and a bookshelf along the wall, but the main places to sit are either around a large table or in two antique chairs made for show, not comfort. We felt like the owners have missed a major opportunity here because if this room had a couple of big, lazy chairs and/or a comfortable couch, Posada al Sur would feel so cozy we may not have wanted to leave.

But we respect their intentions as well as all their efforts to offer, in general, such great value for money in the heart of a capital city. None of the owners were particularly talkative (though they may not have warmed to us much after our screaming robbery drama of the first night), but they were all incredibly helpful whenever we had questions.

When we arrived we were given a big map of the whole city and the woman marked down so many points of interest and tips for getting around the city. Dani had a dental issue during our stay, and another one of the four made calls around town to find the best option for foreigners not on the national insurance program of Uruguay. The hotel also rents bikes at competitive prices ($5 half day, $10 full day), and yet another of the owners took the time to map out a good ride along the coast. Montevideo is perfect for cycling with a promenade all the way from the old city to Pocitos, home to the glitzy high rise condos along several sandy beaches.

Best of all, for digital nomads at least, was the fast, reliable Wi-Fi that allowed us to get plenty of work done and refresh our podcasts which hadn’t been updated more than a few at a time during the journey to the end of the world.

Stand Out Feature: The ambience 

No matter whether it was from a rain storm that hit one afternoon, an adrenaline rush from our attempted robbery and Dani’s trip to the dentist, or a wind-whipped ride along the coast, once we escaped inside into Posada al Sur, we always felt immediately at home. Again, it has the feel of staying with friends, the natural light keeps the house bright during the day, our cavernous room and comfortable bed were great to escape to at night and we felt welcome to spend time working, cooking, snacking and conversating in the kitchen together with other guests or each other. There was art on the walls and bookshelves stuffed with quirky books, dolls and other knick-knacks that added to the homely feel.

Room for Improvement: Locks and Keys

Uruguayans love their big, gold skeleton keys and old-fashioned locks, but we can’t stand them. Here at Posada al Sur we found them particularly problematic because, especially at night, we just wanted to slip inside off the street, and were often fumbling with the door, trying to get it lined up right and it took several attempts until we got the hang of it. There was also an issue locking our room one night, and while we did manage to get it sorted, we would just really appreciate new locks and modern keys on this already renovated house.

Room for Improvement: Missed opportunities

The hotel is a co-op, owned by four (or so) local 30-somethings who seem to have a bit of trouble translating their very good intentions into reality. For example, we chose the hotel for its promise of organic breakfast and while we were still obviously impressed compared to what we were used to, the breakfast, outside of the honey, was not organic, and serving sugary junk food cornflakes instead of a homemade (or locally bought) organic granola, for example, was a bit of a slap in the face. Also, in addition to the common room missing a cozy factor, there were also large (think conference-sized) posters promoting social responsibility and other posters, brochures and pamphlets in support of specific women’s and indigenous groups. However, while these messages were quite in your face, it was entirely unclear how the co-op owners were involved with any of this and how much, if any, of what we paid actually went to help anyone at all.  The intentions are noble, relevant and important, which is why we would like to see more evidence that these aren’t just superficial marketing techniques to sell rooms to a niche of mature, socially conscious clientele.

Overall

Our stay at Posada al Sur was what we were looking for – it is as functional as it is comfortable with quality mattresses in big rooms, a fully-stocked kitchen, plenty of hot water, clean bathrooms, great Wi-Fi, a big breakfast, strong coffee and access to the machine to make more later. For their sake we hope that the Ciudad Vieja area starts to live up to its potential because as soon as it does, Posada al Sur is perfectly placed between the port, the coast, a great market and the Plaza Independencia.

Details

Location: Perez Castellano, Ciudad Vieja, Montevideo, Uruguay
Price: Starting at US$16 for a dorm bed, US$50 for a double room (shared bathroom), US$60 for a double room (private bathroom)
LGBT Friendly: Yes
Digital Nomad Friendly: Yes
Amenities: Complimentary breakfast, free wi-fi, library, rooftop terrace, hammocks, bicycle rental
Website: www.posadaalsur.com.uy

Hotel Tip of the Week: Posada al Sur | Montevideo, Uruguay is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

The little town, which sits on the edge of the driest and highest desert in the world, is the main base for tourists visiting the many attractions here: steaming geysers, volcanic lagoons and hot springs, salt flats with pink flamingos and salt caves, sand dunes, erratic rock formations and other-worldly landscapes. The Atacama Desert offers some of the most spectacular scenery in all of Chile, but the experience is augmented by the fact that the town of San Pedro de Atacama itself is a really charming, strangely chic and gastronomically friendly place in its own right.

The tiny town exists almost entirely due to tourism, and the few dusty roads are lined with restaurants, guest houses and tour agencies all there to cater to the needs of tourists. The central plaza is anchored by a beautiful white church, which is unique with its creaky, wooden floor. The surprisingly good food, the laid-back vibe, and the remarkable scenery all helped San Pedro de Atacama make it into the Top Five Favorite Places we visited in the past twelve months! We are looking forward to returning there on our way to Bolivia later this year.

Polaroid of the week: San Pedro de Atacama, An Oasis in the Desert is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

To trek or not to trek

A major difference between going on vacation and traveling long(ish)-term is this: when you go on vacation, you have already carefully researched and chosen your destinations (and possibly tour providers) before ever stepping foot on the plane. When travel is your lifestyle – okay, when WE travel – you let destinations come to you. In other words, aside from the main stops, the decision to visit certain destinations is made after talking to fellow travelers, being won over by posts on other travel blogs and studying guidebooks for more detail.

When we announced our trip to South America, we heard over and over again “You have to do the W Trek.” What is this trek about, we wondered? It turns out that this is one of those great hikes in the world, regularly appearing in The World’s Ten Best Treks’ lists in magazines across the globe. So obviously we considered tackling it as we neared the Torres del Paine National Park in southern Chilean Patagonia.

What makes the W Trek such a remarkable hike? It turns out, this is a multi-day hike whose trials form a cursive letter W throughout the park and although it much of it is ranges from intermediate to difficult levels of hiking, the experience is supposed to be the pure essence of Patagonia. In those 4-5 days you experience glaciers, massive mountains, crystal blue lakes, waterfalls and exotic wildlife like Guanacos (part of the Llama family) ñandus (similar to Emus), plus foxes and even pumas. The park is name after its most famous mountain range, ‘Los Tres Torres’, or the Three Towers and ‘Paine’ is the local indigenous word for blue, an amazing array of which you see throughout the park from the sky and lakes to the floating chunks of glaciers (which we’ll get to in a bit).

Sounds amazing, right? Here’s the thing. We love day hiking, but not 4-5 days in a row, plus the whole experience is quite costly. The refugios (hostels along the trek) run $40 for a dorm bed, and meals are apparently so overpriced that people who’ve done the trek recommend lugging around all your own food for five days. We’d have to buy or rent warm clothes, as our supply is limited and the weather in Torres del Paine can change dramatically hours at a time. Then we read about bed bugs in some of the refugios and that was that. We were not going to do the W trek.

Instead, we took the five-hour bus ride from El Calafate, Argentina to Puerto Natales, Chile, the small Patagonian city popular as the base for trips into the park. We had intentions of sorting out a day trek to the three towers, which is a highlight section of the trek, but after a few failed attempts, we settled on an all-day tour that included several stops at the main viewing points and short hikes in the park.

For those non-trekkers out there, this was a great way to actually see more of the park than you would on the W Trek. The tours all cost roughly the same, at $40 per person, plus the $36 park fee on top, which worked out to be more expensive than renting a car but easier to get to the park’s highlights without having to do any more of that pesky research!

Torres del Paine National Park begins 112km (70mi) north of Puerto Natales. The minivan tour started by speeding through the vast pampa straight toward the looming mountains of the park, making one short stop first at the Milodon cave. The prehistoric cave was probably carved out by rushing water from nearby melting glaciers thousands of years ago, but what makes these deep caves so famous is the discovery of skin and bones of the prehistoric giant ground sloth, the Milodon.

From there the tour continued on into the park, driving along nearly empty dirt roads. 100,000 hikers visit Torres Del Paine every year, or under 275 per day, meaning we felt like we had this national park almost entirely to ourselves. The first stop was the first highlight – a viewpoint overlooking a bright blue mountain lake with snow-capped mountains in the background.

Massive icebergs at Lago Grey

The first hike of the day was a short trail to Lago Grey, walking across a wooden footbridge, through a forest and down onto a beach around the lake. The temperature dropped dramatically as we neared the massive blue icebergs floating in the lake which had calved off the nearby glacier. Wind-wipped and freezing, we posed in front of the blue ice blocks and even got to touch some of the smaller ‘cubes’ that floated to the water’s edge.

We warmed up back in the van, stopped at another mountain lake and then stopped at one of the refugios for lunch. Our lunches packed, we headed away from the restaurant and up onto a small hilltop where three, then four, graceful guanacos grazed and galloped right by us. At first we had stunned faces to match the cast of Jurassic Park viewing dinosaurs for the first time, but as we still observing them, warming ourselves in the sun, it really set in how magical the park can feel – so pure, natural and exotic down at the end of the earth.

The tour continued on with gorgeous viewpoints every so often until the driver stopped for our second ‘hike’, which was really a 30 minute easy walk that led to a lookout above and just to the side of a rushing waterfall and paths up and down to different vantage points.

Along the path, the burnt trees were painful evidence of the terrible forest fires Torres del Paine suffered a few years ago when a tourist’s campfire got out of control and thousands of acres were burnt to the ground.

The water rushing down is so powerful and the water is pristine enough to drink, if only I could have just held the water bottle under that giant faucet…

The grand finale: The Three Towers viewpoint

These three towers have come to symbolize the park, the hikes, really the entire reason most people make the trip to this part of Patagonia. On the day tour, it was entirely anticlimactic, with a quick stop at a lookout spot with views of the three towers tucked behind a mountain in front of it. Watching herds of sheep running across the road nearby – and the reaction of a Japanese tourist who had never seen such a thing before – was actually much more memorable than this stop of the tour.

Even without feeling the buzz of accomplishment from at least a day hike to the towers, this day tour made the trip to Puerto Natales and Torres del Paine completely worth it. The city itself was a fun place to hang out for a day or two after the tour, as well. Not even ten years ago there was almost nothing but the basics here, and now Puerto Natales is home to several great restaurants, a clean central park perfect for people watching and one of Chile’s typical riverfront promenades with beautiful statues, a BMX bike ramp, benches and incredible views out over the water that remind you just how far south you have really come.

Details and tips

If you are looking to visit Torres Del Paine National Park in a day tour, check out the tour agency at the Patagonia Aventura hostel (on the west side of the Central Plaza in Puerto Natales). They can also set up multi-day hikes and other excursions.

Rental cars are available in Puerto Natales and start at around US$70 per day.

TorresdelPaine.com has a range of maps for the W trek, the Circuit (an 8-9 day hike in Torres Del Paine) and other treks. They also have a listing of all the lodging options in the park. Make sure to book ahead since the refugios fill up quickly, especially between December and March.

Torres del Paine: Patagonia’s essence in a day is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

We meet new people almost every day, and 99% of the time, this is the very first question that sparks a conversation.

The recent six-month stint in South America was tour-heavy in places like Chile’s Lake District, Patagonia and the Atacama Desert. We spent a lot of time in small groups of 10-12 people from around the world, making conversation together in a minivan for several hours. These tours follow a very distinct pattern, and guides almost always identify nationalities from the start – sometimes names are never even given. Dani becomes Germany, I become the U.S., others symbolically represent their countries, like flags.

Nationality as Cliffs Notes

Most people answer where they are from without a second thought. Nationality is a shorthand for understanding individuals within an international group dynamic. Still, it strikes me as strange that in a time of mass migration, global travel and with so much of our lives lived online, so many people, especially travelers, would cling to a definition of identity rooted in a person’s birth place.

Is nationality at the core of individual identity in the 21st century?

Case in point: on a tour of the Quebrada de las Conchas, we got to talking to a solo female traveler who the guide had already established was from Australia. Without realizing it, Dani and I had put her in a box, categorized her as Australian and whatever ideas and stereotypes we have developed about Aussies over the years. As the conversation developed, however, we discovered that she was based in Canada, having given up her career as a driver of dynamite trucks in Oz to put travel and a life abroad first. She was working in restaurants first in Dublin, where she met her Irish boyfriend,  then they moved together to Canada. now they were traveling South America together (he was flying in that next week). Her being Aussie was only one small part of who she really was, and I was so much more impressed by the dynamite truck driver idea. Nationality lent only a small insight but often times this is the main criteria people use to form an opinion at a moment’s notice.

Nomads have a nationality, too 

Since becoming nomadic, I’ve been faced with this question, ‘Where are you from?’ more than the rest of my life combined. Every day I answer with’ the United States’, ‘the States’, ‘Los Estados Unidos’ or ‘aus den Staaten’.

This automatically comes to define me, which seems so odd since we are entirely homeless by choice and so many people are living location independent lifestyles with such ease. This is a time when it is not uncommon for bi-national children to be born in a third country to serial expat parents. How will a child with German-Japanese parents born in Bali identify his or her nationality as an adult? And yet while many of the simplistic 1990s era theories on globalization have come to fruition, I wonder if we will ever really become borderless in our minds. In fact, on the backend of globalization came a trend toward the hyperlocal. How important is nationality to your own sense of identity vs your city or even your hobbies or your career?

When I answer the oft-asked question, Dani often chimes in almost to my ‘defense’, qualifying my response with: “but she hasn’t lived there for 13 years.” And that’s true. I essentially became an adult abroad.

It’s been a while…

My first real job, at 22 years old, was in Guatemala, but I have always felt that the three years I lived in Germany are when I became a grown up. In a sense, I was socialized there, renting a real apartment, paying taxes, working full time. Yet unlike German nationals, there is a sense of schizophrenia as an expat. I was constantly comparing the life I was actually living to the one I would have lived in the U.S., as reflected by friends and family based at home.

Although I had no intentions to become ‘German’, there is a political and social mindset that formed during my time there that is permanently part of my identity.

Adapting to German food culture…

Then there were the four years in Britain after my fashionable quarter life crisis. It was here where I got my Masters degree and did the only true office work I have ever done, at the national tourism board of Britain – an intercultural gig filled with trilingual opportunities based on my biggest interest (travel) and best skills (media, writing and languages). Yet all this job did was make me feel very, very American with a funny accent who just couldn’t understand British humor.

In fact, while living abroad, all of my experiences were filtered through my nationality, and everyone has an opinion about my country that they like to share with me. In that way, I have experienced a way of being American that is entirely different to my fellow citizens at home.

I left just after George W Bush was elected into office the first time. I watched September 11th happen broadcast on MTV Latin America from a flea infested couch in Antigua, Guatemala and when I moved to Germany in 2003, it was to a small, former east German city. Here I became the face of America for people with strong opinions in a post-communist, freshly post-9/11 world. I watched Bush’s re-election in 2004 there, running to the teacher’s lounge during every class break, returning feeling forced to explain and contextualize the election for students stunned by his win. When Obama was elected in 2008, I felt the relief of most Americans abroad (to not have to consider pretending to be Canadian, ey) and I shared the experience of his jolly 2012 re-election with jovial expats in a bar in Buenos Aires.

Cut to now, three years into location independence, and the two of us aren’t based anywhere. We are a German-American couple with bank accounts in England. My visa for the UK is about to run out, and Dani has officially unregistered from Germany. This year we have to figure out where to base our business now that we are technically not based in England. No wonder nationality, for us, is such a low grade qualifier. Yet my identity, now more than ever, is qualified by the use of my blue passport – crossing borders, getting visas and meeting new people. We also spend more time in the United States than I have since 1999 – at least eight weeks a year three years running.

Culture conflict and why I love New York

Abroad, I feel decidedly American, but in country I tend to feel out of place. In my decade-plus abroad, the country has changed fundamentally. I am afraid I will never understand things like the civil war between Democrats and Republicans (two sides of the same coin, if you ask me) and the segregation between ‘liberals’ and ‘conservatives’ that divides families and even the closest of friends. The extreme gun violence (and defense of it under the idea of liberty), the odd seemingly backward-moving debate on Darwinism v. Creationism, and the blind acceptance of big food industries that Europe has managed to so vehemently oppose on the general principle of human survival.

Oddly enough, arriving in New York this past week I feel a sense of  being ‘at home’ for the first time in ages. This great city seems to embody a genuine sense of American-ness that I hold most dear, not only the ideals represented in Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty, but the reality of people of all backgrounds and cultures living together in a way that positively affects the character of the city. This is the idea of America I believed in before I left the first time – except for the fashion, and some of the technology. After a long time away, I feel like Marty McFly, taking a trip back to the future, with the automated tellers at the grocery store, doors that open without touching them and ordering take out from an iPhone app.

But give me another week or two, and I’ll be ready to get on my hoverboard.

Final thoughts

I wonder, is there any quality that can be so defining to others you meet when traveling or living abroad other than your nationality? In a world that has gone global and back again, will there be other attributes in the future that are of equal or even more importance? Will the borders in our minds ever really disappear, or will nationality always serve as the filter through which individuals experience the world?

What I Wonder When I Wonder: Does Nationality Really Matter? is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

These didn’t look anything like the bright white salt flats of Argentina, or the ones we knew to be over the border in Bolivia. Instead, the 100km by 80km area looks rough and rugged, with grayish rocks jutting up from the ground as far as the eye can see. In actual fact, these are much more impressive because instead the salt also reaches over 1.5km deep (!), whereas the more famous salt flats have only a thin layer on the surface 100-200 centimeters thick. Plus, the Salar de Atacama has pink flamingos! That’s right – in the middle of the salt flats surrounded by volcanoes and two mountain ranges, the extremely salty Laguna Cejar lagoo is home to the Los Flamencos Nature Reserve, home to not one but two species of endangered pink flamingos, plus dozens of other bird species and lizards. The contrast of pink on white made for unexpectedly great photos at our last stop in Chile (for now!).

Polaroid of the week: Flamingo in Chile’s Salt Flats is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com

As we sat down to review this third year of our travels this morning, Dani said something that, although it was an offhand remark, really resonated with me. Instead of happy anniversary, or happy travel-versary, she said ‘Happy Birthday’. Had this journey only lasted six months or a year, the results would have been temporary, but with three years under our belts and no end in sight, it is now clear that April 30, 2010 was the start of entirely new lives for us both.

This celebration also gives us the chance to take a look back at the last 365 days to get a sense of just how much two people can squeeze into 52 weeks. What we have discovered is that life is going to fly by, and at our age years fly by the way that months used to, so why not try to pack in as much as possible into each set of four seasons.

So, let’s look at our travel by numbers for May 2012 – April 2013. We first asked the main questions, like…

How many countries did we visit? Seven – 7

Unlike in previous years, we spent longer amounts of time in fewer countries. Last year we hit 13, this year, ‘only’ seven.

1. India
2. USA
3. Mexico
4. Costa Rica
5. Argentina
6. Chile
7. Uruguay

Clockwise: Indian family in Hampi, Jess in Arizona, Mexico City’s Catedral Metropolitana, Sunset in Costa Rica, Perito Moreno Glacier in Argentina, Mates in Uruguay, Laguna Miñiques in Chile’s Atacama Desert.

In the last 365 days, how many borders did we cross? Thirteen – 13

We may have only spent time in seven countries, but we crossed back and forth over and through the Andes several times between Argentina and Chile, which really upped our numbers here to 13 borders. That’s roughly one border per month, but it didn’t work out that way chronologically.

1. India to USA (by plane from Kochi to Tucson via Delhi, Frankfurt and Chicago)
2. USA to Mexico (by plane from Denver to Cancun)
3. Mexico to Costa Rica (by plane from Mexico City to San Jose, with a short stop in Guatemala)
4. Costa Rica to Mexico (by plane from San Jose to Mexico City)
5. Mexico to Argentina (by plane from Mexico City to Buenos Aires)
6. Argentina to Chile (by bus from Buenos Aires to Santiago via Los Libertadores border crossing)
7. Chile to Argentina (by bus from Ancud to Bariloche via Cardenal Antonio Samore Pass)
8. Argentina to Chile (by bus from El Calafate to Puerto Natales via Villa Dorotea)
9. Chile to Argentina (hitchhiked from Porvenir to San Sebastian border crossing on Tierra del Fuego)
10. Argentina to Uruguay (by plane from Ushuaia to Montevideo)
11. Uruguay to Argentina (by bus from Montevideo to Rosario)
12. Argentina to Chile (by bus from Jujuy to San Pedro De Atacama via Paseo de Jama)
13. Chile to USA (by plane from Santiago to New York City via Panama and Orlando)

In the last 365 days, how many beds did we sleep in? Fifty seven – 57

In the last 365 days, we slept in 57 beds. Compared to Year 1, which totalled 104 beds and Year 2, when we slept in 90 beds, 57 beds doesn’t seem like much at all. However, that’s a huge number considering we lived in just one place for almost one month in Tucson, under two months in Mexico and again Costa Rica, six weeks in Buenos Aires and then seven weeks in Santiago. If you took out all our housesits and extended stays in places, it’s roughly one new bed every three days. What we see from Year 3 is that we have really found a balance between housesitting and long-term stays and heavy travel for a few months at a time.

In the last 365 days,  how many types of transportation did we take? 

22 buses, not including 6 night buses
12 planes
7 car rentals
6 trains, all in India
4 Boats
1 Ferry
1 Houseboat

More travel by numbers for our third year on the road 

# of night buses – 6

These do not count as beds, not even partial beds, even though the bus companies in South America called them ‘semi-camas’ (semi-beds). On six occasions we spent the night traveling on a bus, getting very little sleep, clinging to our bags and hoping not to have to use the bathroom. The scenery during the day is spectacular, but once the sun sets these rides are no fun at all.

# of beaches – 15

We started the year on Indian beaches in Kerala and Goa, then lived on a couple in Mexico and Costa Rica, but even though we followed Chile’s coastline up and down, our South American beach time was limited. Uruguay has gorgeous beaches, and we definitely see ourselves spending more time in Punta del Diablo in the future.

# of days on the beach – 132

Over one-third of our third travel year was spent living on a beach…so…no complaints here!

# of Housesits – 5

We had a stellar year in this category, with five amazing housesitting opportunities. Our housesits from April 2012 to April 2013 took place in Tucson, Arizona; The Costa Maya in Mexico; Costa Rica; Santiago de Chile and now Brooklyn, New York.

# of books published – 1

You all know that we are huge fans of housesitting, which is why this year we also put together every single possible piece of information you could ever need to be a successful housesitter in our book Break Free: The Ultimate Guide to Housesitting. If you own a home, having housesitters allows you travel for longer periods of time without paying a dime for pet or house care. If you are location independent like us, or want to be, housesitting allows you to stay around the world with all the creature comforts of home, rent free and without all the commitment. We can’t recommend housesitting highly enough and encourage you all to get started!

Our eBook, Break Free

# of posts published – 163
From May 2012 – April 2013, we hit ‘publish’ on a post every 2 days on average. While we hope each post is informative, useful, insightful, entertaining and filled with travel porn photos, we’re proud that we still have such a passion for travel that we never run out of things to write about. Hell, you should see the backlog of posts lined up on South America, and who knows how much we’ll be able to cover about New York!

# of new elements on GlobetrotterGirls.com – 4

This site saw the addition of three new series – the What I Wonder When I Wander series, our She Said, She Said series and the GlobetrotterGirl of the Month feature. We also started a newsletter (are you getting it yet?) where we share more info about our lives beyond the blog, answer reader questions, offer travel tips, and give things away for free.

# of times as conference panelists  - 1

Technically only Jess was a panelist at the Meet, Plan, Go event in Chicago last October, combining the stint with a trip home to see her family while Dani held down the housesitting fort in Costa Rica. The event was an amazing opportunity to connect with over 150 people who were all about to head off on long term trips, from a month or two to complete location independence!

# of pizzas – 45

Considering the fact that we got healthier than ever this year doing the Insanity workout and eating healthier than ever before, this number seems a bit high. However, yes, in the last 52 weeks we scarfed down 45 pizzas, 15 of which were in our six weeks in Buenos Aires. Somehow Jess still dropped three sizes, so no harm, no foul!

# of cities visited – 14

Although it felt like we spent much of our time traveling through barren South American landscapes, we actually spent time in 14 cities this year including major world cities like New York, Chicago, Mexico City, Buenos Aires and Santiago, as well as smaller cities like Valparaiso, Chile and Rosario and Salta, Argentina.

# of things lost – 7

This number is entirely an estimate, because we often don’t even realize the things that we lose along the way. We’re not big on possessions so most of these didn’t affect us, but losing Dani’s iPod somewhere in Santiago and the charger and cable in northern Argentina hurt a bit (okay, a lot). We also lost a bikini top, an iPhone charger and cable, Jess’ driver’s license, a good razor and at least 10 pairs of socks.

# of amazing wildlife animals – 11 (rough estimate)

We saw elephants (and cows) in India, and lived on the beach in tropical Costa Rica last yaer, which meant we had monkeys and coatis right outside our backyard. Dani witnessed the incredible sea turtle Arribada in nearby Ostional beach there, too. In South America, there were penguins, sea lions and ñandus in Patagonia, alligators at Iguazu Falls, plus llamas and their relatives guanacos and vicuñas, flamingos and loads of different birds in northern Argentina and Chile.

# of injuries – 4 (all Jess)

Despite this being my healthiest year since my early 20s, I spent much of it quite injured. In fact, after a residual knee injury caused serious knee pain in India, what spurred the health kick was being rammed by a cow in Palolem and being unable to walk for three weeks (I guess I really needed a swift kick in the ass, no?) After resting and healing up nicely in Tucson and Mexico, I broke my baby toe walking barefoot on the beach, which sidelined me for another month. We started the Insanity workout in September and rocked through this plus outdoor park workouts even as we traveled through Chile, but feeling so much healthier than ever, I pushed it too hard and strained my ankle which meant Dani had to do most of the Patagonia hiking without me. I’m happily ending this third year injury free!

# of photos taken – 13,001

Dani took just (just) over 13,000 pictures over the last year – an average of over 1,000 photos per month. Surprisingly, this is less than last year, when she snapped 15,437 pictures.

Budget – How much does a year of travel cost?

Budgeting is not something that comes easily to us, but damn if Dani isn’t diligent about tracking our spending. This year we started using the TrailWallet app, which helps us keep track of and categorize every single peso, rupee, dollar and pound we spend each day and categorize it to see what areas make the biggest dent in our bank accounts.

If there is one thing we can say about our budget, it is that we are now more confident in spending money. Looking back at our first year, we only spent $28,484 between two people. Back then, being unsure of how to sustain our earnings, we were clearly shoestring travelers.

As soon as we were sure this was going to be a lifestyle, not just a ‘trip’ we knew we had to start living more comfortably. This meant that in our second year, spending increased by almost $10,000, reaching $38,152 for two people.

This seems to be our ‘comfort zone’, and even though it seemed like we were just hemorrhaging money traveling through South America in high season, we ended our third year of travel on a similar budget, spending $37,588 between 1 May 2012 and 30 April 2013.

That said, there are some huge difference in how much we spent in each place – in India for example, we spent just over $500 each per month, while in Buenos Aires, Argentina that shot up to almost $2000 per person per month.

Our top 5 favorite places

Our Mexican beach house

So remote we had no cell reception and were entirely off-the-grid, living on a remote Mexican beach for two months gave us the chance to live a life that few people ever have. Life was so laid-back here, in fact, that when my sandals broke, I just went barefoot for two weeks before we made a trip to the big supermarket, three hours away.

Buenos Aires

We knew we’d love it here, but had no idea just how much. The attraction is not only because of the architecture, or the pizza, or the street art, or the Argentine accent (which we did get used to and ended up really loving) or the combination of the above. It is all of that on top of the open, friendly community of that welcomed us with open arms and within days we had full social calendars as thought we had been living there for years.

San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

This town thousands of kilometers north of Santiago and over 4,000m (13,000ft) above sea level is like Mad Max meets rock festivals. Just a few minutes out of town, the landscape looks like the moon or Mars and is just outside of the Atacama desert, the driest in the world. Yet in town, the food in restaurants lining all sand roads is sophisticated and complex, live music spills from bars late into the night and the hotels range well into luxury.

Tucson, Arizona

It would take a stellar year to knock Tucson off our list. There is just something about this low-key, sprawling town 80 miles from the Mexico border that keeps it so high on our list – it might just be the mix of the saguaros, the colors in the sky at sunset, the owners we housesit for and the wild west meets Mexico feeling in the food and art around town.

Cafayate, Argentina

Cafayate and the surrounding countryside was an unexpected gem. The landscape is a combination of bright green vineyards like Napa Valley, red rocks like Colorado, mountains resembling the Grand Canyon and rock formations like Monument Valley, and that all with the snow capped peaks of the Andes in the far background. The town itself feels like a sleepy village and we could have easily spent a week or more here.

Where’s the Big Apple love, you ask?

Although New York City belongs on this list, we’ll save it for next year as we are absolutely certain that no matter where our fourth year takes us, the Big Apple will sit as one of our top five choices. It feels amazing after traveling through Argentine Patagonia and the Chilean desert to be in such a densely packed global city, yet after less than a week we already feel right at home in our Brooklyn four story walk up and know we’ll love every minute of our six week housesit here.

Our top 5 best food moments

Huevos Rancheros in Mexico
The house we lived in was so remote that grocery trucks and tortillas delivered by motorcycle were often our only way to stock up on food between big six-hour round trips to the city. Luckily, Dani perfected the art of Huevos Rancheros, a meal we ate once a day, almost every day, for two months.

Pizzas in Buenos Aires
We’ve raved about this everywhere, so if you don’t already know, find out more about our love of Buenos Aires pizza.

Homecookin’ on the Houseboat in Kerala
Indian food in Malaysia was actually much tastier than in India itself, we found, but our personal chef on our three day houseboat cruise performed magic and miracles to create delicious Keralan feasts three times a day, causing us to spend the entire cruise in a gluttonous food coma  – heaven!

Green smoothies in Santiago
The further along the year progressed, the healthier the two of us got and during our Santiago housesit, we started making green smoothies for breakfast everyday – including spinach, bananas, orange juice, and other fruit and veg. We had glowing skin and loads of energy and missed these so dearly as we traveled the next three months without them.

Food in San Pedro de Atacama
Most restaurants in San Pedro offer three course meals for $15 (incl wine or cocktail) and never once were we disappointed by a meal. We’ll cover this in more detail soon, but who’d’a thunk we could eat like queens in the middle of a desert?

Our top 5 best hotel stays

From luxury to budget and everything in between, we had some amazing accommodation experiences this year!

El Patio 77, Mexico City

We had a sampler of three gorgeous bed and breakfasts during an extended weekend in Mexico City, but eco-focused, traveler-friendly El Patio 77 won above Casa Roa and the Chill Out Flat B&B with its minimalist yet arty design, integration of green technology and location in a quiet neighborhood just three stops from Mexico City’s Zocalo, or central park. Read the Hotel Tip of the Week here.

Hotel Monaco, Denver

With several locations throughout the US, the Monaco has had the chance to perfect its offering to guests, and our stay at the Denver Monaco won us over entirely. This is partially because it is a Kimpton hotel, a chain we are always willing to spend more to stay at, but we loved the wine and cheese hour, the takeaway coffee bar in the morning, the pet-friendly food and water bowls downstairs and the friendliness of the staff. Read the Hotel Tip of the Week here.

Hosteria Yendegaia, Porvenir, Chile

Say you arrived to the end of the world, weary and wind-whipped like we did. Then this comfortable, warm, friendly bed and breakfast in Porvenir would be exactly where you would want to stay. We recharged our batteries, gobbled down homemade soups and warm foods and talked travel with the personable owner. Read the Hotel Tip of the Week here.

Casa Kreyenberg in Valparaiso Chile

Sometimes we imagine ourselves running a bed and breakfast one day, and if we ever do, we hope we stay as down to earth as the owners of this great spot in Valpo. We stayed here for a week and would return again and again. Read the Hotel Tip of the Week here. 

Hostel de la Viuda, Punta del Diablo, Uruguay

This beach town is so relaxed and spread out compared to chic global beach spot Punta del Este a few hours up the road. Most visitors rent out the gorgeous houses here, but we stayed at Hostel de la Viuda, which was relatively inexpensive with a super clean and well-stocked kitchen, friendly staff, fast wi-fi, good music and adorable pets. Hotel Tip of the Week: Coming soon!

And a thousand times thank you!   

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who has been following our journey! Those of you who read our posts, stay up to date with our whereabouts and leave comments on our Facebook page, email us your travel plans and questions and use our travel articles to plan your own trips or even decide to break free entirely – we just can’t thank you enough! Nothing makes our day more than the heartfelt emails from people who have followed our recommendations for a favorite food spot or hotel and loved it as much as we did, and nothing inspires us more than the emails from those who have decided to bite the bullet and make travel a lifestyle as a result of what goes on here on our website. Three years ago we never dreamed we could have an impact like that, even for one person, and we couldn’t be more thankful that you are here!

Looking back…

To see how much things have changed and what stayed the same, take a look at some of the random travel numbers from our first year of travel and second year of travel.

Tops and Flops

To find out more highlights of our third year as GlobetrotterGirls, check out our Tops and Flops posts:

Tops and Flops of days 901-1000
Tops and Flops of days 801-900
Tops and Flops of days 701-800

Happy Anniversary! Today we celebrate three years on the road is a post from: GlobetrotterGirls.com