Not long ago, I finished booking a trip to South America for the Mrs. Guru and I.  Neither of us have been to South America before, so we’re very excited about the trip.  I wanted to share my booking process with you all so that you can see how you might be able to put together a trip like this.

Trip Overview

We’ll first be spending several days in Buenos Aires, Argentina (with a day trip over to Montevideo, Uruguay), and several days in Lima, Peru, including a visit to Machu Picchu (near the city of Cusco).  The routing for the whole trip looks like this:

Here’s how the actual flights break down:

1)  US Airways Flight 802: Depart Charlotte, NC at 8:15 pm, Arrive Sao Paulo at 6:55 am (+1 day)
2)  TAM Airlines  Flight 8000: Depart Sao Paulo at 8:35 am, Arrive Buenos Aires at 11:25 am

We’ll spend about 4 days in Buenos Aires, then fly up to Peru:

3)  LAN Airlines Flight 4640 Depart Buenos Aires at 8:25 am, Arrive Lima at 11:20 am

We’ll spend that day in Lima, and the following morning, fly over to Cuzco to get to Machu Picchu:

4)  LAN Airlines Flight 2095 Depart Lima at 5:45 am, Arrive Cuzco at 8:05 am

After spending a few days at Machu Picchu and Cuzco, we’ll make our way back home, with a stop back in Lima for another afternoon (about 13 hours):

5)  LAN Airlines Flight 2115 Depart Cuzco at 10:05 am, Arrive Lima at 11:20 am
6)  LAN Airlines Flight 2514 Depart Lima at 1:05 am (+1 day), Arrive Miami at 7:50 am
7)  US Airways Flight 1706 Depart Miami at 10:00 am, Arrive Charlotte at 12:10 pm

The best part is, all segments except for the 2 short (300 mile) flights between Lima and Cuzco are in First/Business Class!

The Charlotte to Sao Paulo flight is perfect – leaving in the evening, and about 9 1/2 hours long, which should be optimal for getting a good night’s sleep.  There really aren’t many “exciting” international flights out of Charlotte (a handful to Europe, and only 2 to South America), so in my opinion, I think it’s pretty cool to be able to fly on what I consider to be one of the most interesting flights out of the airport.

Both the Sao Paulo to Buenos Aires and Buenos Aires to Lima flights also feature flat-bed seats, although those flights are during the day (and not nearly as long).

The Lima to Miami flight is “only” 6 hours, which is honestly on the short side when thinking about an overnight flight with a flat bed.  Even though the flight itself is 6 hours, it’s tough to get more than 4-5 hours of sleep in that timeframe, with meals, announcements, etc.

The flight does leave late at night (just after 1:00 am), so at least we can plan to eat dinner prior to boarding, and hopefully get to sleep soon after departure.  There really wasn’t any other good way to get back to North Carolina from Peru, so we settled for the relatively short overnight flight.  With a flat bed, I much prefer an 8-9 hour flight so that I can get 6-7 hours of good sleep….but I know, I know, #firstworldproblems

Booking Process

So, how did I book all of this?

The trip required a total of 104,500 miles per person, broken down into the following:

Below is the British Airways redemption chart, so you can see how the Buenos Aires to Lima flight just barely sneaks into the 1150-1999 mile range at 1974 miles in distance:

So all in all, I used 80,000 American miles and 24,500 British Airways Avios per person.  Where did my miles come from?  I previously earned these miles over the past several years when Citi was running a promotion for 75,000 bonus miles, and American Express was running a promotion for 75,000 bonus Membership Rewards Points (which can be transferred at a 1:1 ratio into British Airways Avios).

Even if you don’t have any miles right now, you could have more than enough miles by simply opening the Citi American Executive Card (100,000 American Miles signup bonus) and the Chase British Airways Visa Card (50,000 British Airways Avios sign up bonus).  Obligatory Disclaimer: of course, I’m not a financial advisor, so make sure to consider your own finances carefully.  If you’re considering this, please do take a moment to read my post about how Credit Cards affect your credit score.

See, you can do this too!  With a little planning ahead, you could be off on an incredible trip to South America  just like this.

Feel free to leave a comment below if you have any questions I can help clarify!