The South American Stopover Adventure: Introduction

• Introduction
• The Ritz Carlton Central Park
• LAN Business Class
• Exploring Central Chile
• The Grand Hyatt Santiago
• Exploring Easter Island
• Exploring Machu Picchu
• Conclusion

Once upon a time, before British Airways referred to their frequent flyer miles as Avios one could book a flight using BA miles and create as many stopovers as you wanted as long as they were considered “along the way”. Wouldn’t you know it, in a roundtrip from New York to Santiago, Chile both Lima, Peru and Easter Island were considered along the way. Yes, I booked a flight for myself and my wonderful wife to go see Santiago, Easter Island and Peru all in the same trip. Actually we flew out of New York and returned to Miami in order to do family vacation with the in-laws (while the other two return home via New York).

When British Airways announced that they were changing their program everyone knew that their miles would have to be devalued because unlimited stopovers was just too good to be true. But it was true so we burned through our points before the change in programs took place. But because we were so booked up with travel already, we had to schedule the trip a year in advance. Still, everyone dreaded the change and I felt the need to burn even more miles while it was such a good deal so we invited friends. I opened up the trip to my old roommates back in Virginia and my good friend Ben decided not to pass up such an offer. Still with miles left over, Caroline (my wife) decided to invite her twin sister Annie, who also couldn’t pass up such an offer.

Unfortunately I had not enough miles for all 4 to fly business class so through a series of events, my friends flew business class while we flew economy. Economy is not my favorite experience but hearing my sister-in-law retell how they just kept giving her food and drinks – like all premium cabins – was worth it. Giving someone their first premium cabin experience is a great gift to give.

So this series is about our journey through South America. We started in New York; spent over a week or so in Chile – flying in and out of Santiago; 4 days on Easter Island; and a few weeks in Peru. It’s a little complicated as my friend Ben (my friend) did not join us in Peru (as he’s already been there) but Annie (my sister-in-law) and us went to Peru where we met Annie’s boyfriend, Jade, in Lima. We then did Machu Pichu all together and Cusco but they left to go home after a week and we stayed for another week or so, just the two of us.

It was a great trip, seeing many epic sites. Obviously we used quite a few frequent flyer miles and not as many hotel points being that we were mostly in remote places. It seems so truly once in a lifetime but this could honestly be recreated by anyone with One World miles and is still a good deal with British Airways Avios.

Details to follow…