Rays from the setting sun spill through the cracked windowpane of an open garage. The tiny dust particles catch in the soft light, swirling ethereally around cars used in the time of our great grandfathers. Phonographs, paraffin lanterns, antique water pitchers, wooden wheel barrels, time appears to have stopped long ago. However, its 2008 and one of Uruguay’s oldest estancias near the town of Carmelo is in its sixth year running as a refurbished luxury bed and breakfast.

Every day of the year, Atilio’s home is open to throngs of hikers seeking a warm meal, mate, and a place to the rest their heads. Refugio Cajón del Azul is set against the startling beauty of the Andean Comarca of the 42nd Parallel, a mountainous area west of El Bolsón and Lago Puelo that has become of one Argentina’s most treasured wilderness sanctuaries.

That’s the problem with small towns: the lack of choice. The long, enthralling drive from Salta had left us peckish, but a lack of options meant we had to wait for the curiously named ‘Los 3 Chinos’ restaurant to open at who-knows-what hour. No choice but to watch the handful of village kids spill onto the dirt football pitch. No choice but to watch lightning flash innocuously above the vast mountains. No choice but to place our beer on the jagged mud wall and amble onto the arena for a kick of the ball.

‘Patagonia’s most present characteristic is its endless expanse of nothingness, both an attraction and a lesson in boredom for the overland traveller’, I read as the plane veered its course towards El Calafate.

Having found a direct flight out of Ushuaia for the same price as a 2-day bus/ weather-dependent ferry/bus/overnight stop in ‘wind-pummelled service town’/bus option, I had, happily, forfeited the first leg of the Ruta 40 that starts in Río Gallegos.

Aliens live among us. No, I’m not being euphemistic, referring to the ghastly tourists who swarm upon Buenos Aires and indeed the rest of South America in the hope of ‘finding themselves’. I am talking actual extraterrestrial, Encounters del Tercer Tipo, high possibility of ‘probing’, aliens. And they are right here in Argentina. Specifically Córdoba.

While most people head to Punta del Este, Punta del Diablo, or Cabo Polonio those adventurous few who are not deterred by unreliable bus companies and useless park rangers head to the blue waters and soft rolling dunes of Santa Teresa, in the Rocha province in Uruguay. Each summer visitors are drawn to its beaches and the park’s other main attraction, it’s namesake.

Nestled in a river valley with the granite peaks of Cerro Torre and Cerro Fitzroy looming in the distance, the Patagonian village of El Chaltén has quickly become one of the most sought-after spots in the region. Yet despite it’s recent surge in popularity, El Chaltén remains pristine – an idyllic counterpoint to its bustling, more tourist-centred cousins like El Calafate and Bariloche.

Ushuaia, the last town at the southern tip of Tierra del Fuego, quickly became just a tiny bright spot behind the stern. The MS Hanseatic was heading south, towards Antarctica, towards the cold. In the coming three weeks, she would steer us through the icy waters that surround the Antarctic Peninsula, on to South Georgia, and finally the Falkland Islands.

Traditionally, carnaval is a period for people of the Catholic faith to let their hair down and enjoy the vices they are going to be giving up for the 40 days of Lent. Nowadays the religious roots of carnaval are arguably taking more of a back seat, meaning that carnaval typically extends well into the Lenten period. It is not uncommon for festivities to take place throughout the first three months of each new year. See carnaval celebrations in Argentina, Brazil and Boliva for the complete experience.

Arriving alone and under cover of night at the bus station (which is never the nicest place in Brazil to be), I began to think I had committed a grave error. Little did I know that in Florianópolis (or Floripa as it’s affectionately known by locals) I would find some of the nicest scenery, best beaches and friendliest company in all of Brazil.