South American Travel Experience – Greg & Jane

Greg and Jane have travelled the world together. Now retired, they plan and book their own adventures. Greg books the flights, trains, and cars and creates the entire itinerary for their holidays. They are not afraid of exploring. But then they decided to venture to South America… and they were stuck. With the language difference and a limited knowledge of the area, Greg didn’t feel comfortable making all their plans as he usually did. On the recommendation of a friend, he contacted David at Forward Travel.

Given his experience in booking so many of his own travels in the past, Greg emailed David with information about their past travels. The types of activities they enjoy and avoid while travelling, plus an idea of what they were looking for with their trip to South America.

All questions that David would ask a new client to help plan their dream journey.

“Forward Travel aren’t your shopfront travel agency. It’s a different experience to working with a regular agency. Very little of what we did was part of a package – we were putting together pieces of a puzzle to make our own trip.”

It didn’t take them very long before they had locked in an itinerary.

Greg and Jane had a high level of trust in David from the beginning.

The Forward Travel team were very responsive and able to accommodate Greg and Jane’s needs and beyond.

David helped them with things like paying in foreign currency and sharing his knowledge of destinations plus his local contacts in South America to ensure a smooth journey.

“David’s knowledge and experience of South America were excellent. He has obviously travelled to South America more than once and can talk from firsthand experience about what we were planning to do in relation to activities and accommodation. That’s why I was happy to use Forward Travel.”

Separately to the booking Greg and Jane had made with Forward Travel, they had already booked a cruise to Antarctica. David had planned the rest of the South American trip around this cruise.

But three months out from their departure, the cruise was cancelled. David immediately got to work plugging the hole left by the cancelled cruise to ensure that Greg and Jane’s journey flowed seamlessly. David replaced the Antarctica cruise with a five-night cruise of the Patagonian fjords then a trip across to Torres del Paine where the couple could pick up the rest of their itinerary.

In Patagonia, Greg and Jane stayed at the luxury Explora hotel. They had known about Explora before they started planning the trip and asked David to include a stay on their itinerary. “The Explora was memorable in terms of physical location, activities, and level of service. It is worth every cent you spend.”

Another highlight of the trip was something that came on David’s recommendation – a trip to El Calafate and El Chaltén on the Argentine side of Patagonia. As Greg and Jane prefer to get off the tourist trail and were looking for more outdoor experiences, David suggested hiking in the area and driving from El Calafate to El Chaltén. Jane was concerned about the drive but in the end, it was a truly memorable and enjoyable experience.

For this usually independent couple who organise their own travels, they recognised the absolute value of working with the team at Forward Travel.

“I got a lot of value out of Forward Travel in terms of assistance from David and the team. The confidence that I developed through the process that things would be organised well was high and they certainly delivered.”