Argentina and Chile 2012

Off for another trip with Anton - a return to South America - this time to Buenos Aires, Argentina and a brief return visit to Santiago, Chile across the Andes. BA's been on the list of places to see for some time, and a good priced ticket during October school holidays (Australia) sealed the deal. Direct flight by Aerolineas Argentinas might not seem a good idea to some, but - who cares - it's a means of getting from A to B (or from S to B.A. if you like).

Preparation:

Like our previous trips, first up is the ticket, then a Lonely Planet book - not too keen on the disk versions - nothing like scrolling through a book despite the extra weight.
Next thing is clean up the backpacks and dig out the list of essentials to take. Could be a bit cold at 4000m up the Andes, so some extra weight needed for that.
Tennis racquets - clay courts ! Nothing like the French Open being on to convince us to take tennis racquets along to see what clay court tennis is like. Anyway why WOULDN'T you take tennis racquets with you when backpacking ? (Along with proper tennis shoes - of course.)
A hundred US dollars just in case, but LP says the ATMs are fine.
Scroll through Lonely Planet and TripAdviser to find the first night's accommodation seeing as we're arriving late.
There's a Juanes concert on in BA whilst we're there
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0BM8WChlP8&list=PL0KYs3uQy2ELhUDi6JCwUe_xI1p0xnTk-
so booked some tickets online.
My mighty $180 Lenovo T60 laptop lives to see another world trip in a backpack. If anyone wants me to do an advert on the T60's reliability, I'm ready and willing.....for free !
Anton's been doing Spanish for 4 years at school, so no need for the Spanish phrase book (my opinion). Also means that the trip is really only to help to improve his Spanish ...of course.
Games/books/nibblies for the plane.
That's it - we're off !

Adios Australia