A taste of true Brazilian culture is waiting for you just a short trip from Rio in Minas Gerais. By Lindsey Witthaus When most people picture Brazil they usually conjure up images of Rio de Janeiro and its many postcard-worthy locations such as Sugar Loaf Mountain and the famous Ipanema [...]

Probably not, but you can make a valiant effort and try, so long as that nasty sunburn doesn’t totally incapacitate you, you survive that skull-crushing fall from the Class IV rapids, and you don’t react too badly from that orange-kneed tarantula bite (actually the venom is unlikely to kill you [...]

Blessed with stunning views and located in what seems like worlds apart from the overcrowded, tourist-friendly sections of the city, Rio’s slums or “favelas” may soon become the city’s trendiest destination. Favelas like Vidigal, which overlooks Ipanema Beach and the Cagarras Islands (and was the filming locale for “City of [...]

One of the world’s most spectacular sights, Machu Picchu may be a victim of its own success, so says David Rich in this article over at GoNomad. Now, roughly 100 years from the day it was discovered, over 400,00 visitors a year make the 28-mile trek along the Inca Trail [...]

Amanda, over at Jaunted, is blogging her trip down south to Colombia (sound familiar?). I’m looking forward to following this trip. I don’t know why it is, but don’t you always like to hear about someone else’s trip to somewhere you’ve recently been? I’ve heard a lot of other travelers [...]

Mendoza offers all the quality wines, scenic vistas and epicurean escapism as its sister wine-growing regions — Bordeaux and Napa — but good luck getting an up-close, intimate experience while in either of those two places. As Laura learns while exploring the region in this BT piece, ” . . [...]

One night as I was returning to my hostel in Santa Marta, Colombia, I ran into a group of guys from Ireland who had just arrived from Venezuela. “How’d you guys like it?” I asked. “It’s a very beautiful country,” one of the guys responded. “Just avoid Caracas. I never [...]

As has been widely reported during the last few months, it’s been almost impossible to find Monedas (one peso coins) in Buenos Aires for various reasons, but mainly due to their necessity to ride the city’s buses. Well it looks like BA’s upgrading and instituting an electronic ticketing system, which [...]

These days, it’s more than likely that you’re going to be around many other travelers when you’re in Central and South America. But as Anna points out in this article, Guatemala offers a rare opportunity to see and experience a culture that “remains remarkably untouched by modernity.” In the South [...]

Well it’s not officially my birthday yet for another hour — unless you’re in the Canadian Maritimes, in which case let the revelry begin — but I thought I’d go ahead and imagine spending it in a couple of places I’d rather be today, an annual tradition that I usually [...]