12 Days, Chile, The Great Opportunity to visit lakes, desert, and volcanoes all in one country

Traveler Reviews

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  Kristana

  December 29th, 2025
  2
  Because of the cost and description of the tour in TourRadar, I was under the impression we had booked a real hosted...
  Because of the cost and description of the tour in TourRadar, I was under the impression we had booked a real hosted "tour" vs a trip put together by travel agent. When I asked how many people would be on the tour, I was told "14-20" in our communications, so I expected I would be traveling on a guided tour with other people. This was a trip put together by a travel agent and definitely would not be considered a hosted tour. I would not have booked this particular trip had I known that. While the second half of our trip was excellent, we were disappointed in the first part of the trip. It was disjointed and did not maximize the time well. The other major issue is that it doesn't make sense to check in and out of the hotel in Santiago 3 times. The time should be consolidated for traveler's convenience. We would have preferred to stay overnight in Santiago and take a day trip to Valparaiso, even if required the entire day, then return to our hotel in Santiago. This would eliminate the need to stay in Vina del Mar. - Santiago - 45 by Director is well-located in a wonderful part of town and has excellent and attentive desk staff. While the bedrooms were very clean and linens fresh, we did not feel the toilets and showers were clean as we found hair in 3 separate rooms on our second stay there. The restaurant was great. - Santa Rita - This is a very nice stop and the museum is fantastic. We got the lowest grade of wines without food and did not get the right level of tasting we were supposed to get that included some food. It would be nice to build in the museum time to the winery tour. We tipped Eduardo to stay longer to see the museum and he was able to do it, but had not planned to stay that long. It's important to see it to understand the pre-Colombian history of Chile. Eduardo (driver) was WONDERFUL. He answered a lot of my random questions about Santiago and how people live, but only because I could speak Spanish and ask. - Emiliana Winery - We LOVED this stop. We had to ask for the farm/vineyard tour, which was not a part of our package. This was the highlight of the stop. Our sommelier and farm tour guide was knowledgeable, funny and overall - fabulous. The tasting here was very good and thorough. It included bites of food which was nice. - Valparaiso - The Pablo Neruda house is fantastic and we are very glad we asked to go inside. I'm not sure if that was included in our tour, but it was excellent. We LOVED the street murals! AWESOME. Angel was knowledgeable and took us to a cool gallery too. It would be nice to have had more time to explore here instead of go to Vina del Mar. - Vina del Mar - I would not choose to stay here. This city was not a good choice for us. The hotel was located in a business district and it was not a very nice area to stay. The Pablo Neruda house at Isla Negra was spectacular. We finished our tour early and didn't want to go back to the city, so we paid our driver to take us to a El Trique national park so we would have something to do. Best Western hotel was good and nice staff. - Cooking class - We enjoyed Jenny. She is very nice. The class could be so much more interesting with more about culture and the history of Chilean food. It was very basic and I feel like every Latino country has an empanada so something more Chilean would be preferred. The food was okay. It would be more fun with a larger group, which is what I expected. Nice venue for the class. - Atacama - We really loved this part of the trip and thought everything we did here was WONDERFUL. The hotel was very good and amazing staff, good food. We liked the location. We liked having group tours to get to meet other travelers. It would've been helpful to have a detailed itinerary of each day sent to us with what to bring, food provided, attire to wear to stay warm for the geysers and astronomical tour. It's VERY, VERY cold for the geyser and astro tour and we only knew to take extra layers because another tourist told us to. It's also nice to know in advance that bathrooms are available at most of these sites. Opportunities for improvement: - A huge "miss" was the lack of a guide/host to talk more about the history and culture of the people. While the first guide in Santiago talked about Valdivia and a little about the culture and history when we went to the government buildings, Plaza de Armas, and the mountaintop, it wasn't as much as I'd like to learn about the country. This was really sad for me because I like to learn about the culture, people, food, influences of other cultures in a country, and traditions. I was lucky that I speak Spanish so I could ask questions to the drivers, but no one was able to give deep cultural insights to us. Museo de la Memoria - would be a perfect addition to understand better the shifts in political power and effects on the people The pre-Colombian history museum - Suggest this before the day tour in Santiago to get an understanding of that part of that part of the history. - Provide a detailed schedule of each day. Include: pickup and drop-off time, guide/driver name if known, what to bring, if meals will be provided. We had to ask for details every single day to know the length of each tour and pickup/approx drop off time. - Food/meal inclusions: We did not know breakfast and lunch would be provided on tours in Atacama and got up early to eat or took food along with us, which was often not necessary. Include a timeframe for flights to be booked to Atacama - I had to ask for this and then booked what I thought would work and paid for that flight, but was told it was too early. This was disappointing because the scheduling could have been done right the first time with additional and clear information. As a result, I paid twice for a flight because my original flight was unavailable. Create a checklist for travelers - "Have you booked your flight to Atacama?" for example.Show more
  Traveled in December 2025
  

  Reply from: Responsible Travel South America

  Hello Kristana, thank you very much for your feedback. Comments like yours always help us improve our services, itineraries, and the information passengers need before booking on our platform. We’re also happy to know that you had a great time in Atacama, which is usually one of the highlights of any trip to Chile. I hope you continue knowing all places in South America, we are always happy to assist you with your new adventures.

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