Chile: Go wine sipping, then hit the rapids in northern Patagonia

If you're looking for the trip of a lifetime, National...

Daily Deal: Waldorf Astoria opens in Panama City with $159 rooms

Uruguay: Coastal reveries, away from it all

COLONIA DEL SACRAMENTO, Uruguay — Straddling the crest of a sand dune, my back to the Atlantic Ocean, I watched a Uruguayan boy net...

Daily Deal: Fly to Chile or Argentina, score $27 domestic flight

Travelers who buy a ticket to Argentina,

Travel Brazil by bus for a calm and cheerful trip

SAO PAULO, Brazil — After a few hours, you sink into a pleasant trance. Time no longer matters. You stop checking your phone, if it...

The charms of Old Quito, Ecuador

QUITO, Ecuador — "Not long ago, we wouldn't think of coming to this area," Dominic Hamilton tells me as we stand on a street corner in...

In Guatemala, the lost world of Tikal

TIKAL NATIONAL PARK, Guatemala — The woman in the shorts shrieked, grabbed her ankle and crumpled to the ground as though she'd been...

Discovering the open spirit of Rio de Janeiro

RIO DE JANEIRO — "Should I use violence to restrain you if you want to buy too much?" my Italian roommate asked, seeing my...

Cuzco, Peru's often overlooked treasures

As many a Peruvian traveler can tell you, climbing Machu Picchu is easy, especially if you take one of those tourist buses that do most of...

Around the world in 23 days

Phileas Fogg went around the world in 80 days. I did it in 23. And I bet I visited more amazing sites than he — India's Taj Mahal,...

Scuba diving with Dad in Curaçao

We all marveled at the hideous thing, trying not to gasp through our regulators.

Underwater with the dolphins

Hector looks at me with disappointment. His eyes, 8 inches from my own, express pity for my inability to locate things at the bottom of...

Is Machu Picchu reaching its peak?

At the top of the mountain, where an attendant will take your $46 ticket, foot traffic is steady and cellphone reception is excellent.

In Peru's Colca Valley, a birdwatcher's paradise

Some people head to Peru to climb Incan ruins; some go to sip pisco sours. Me, I went for the birds. The very big birds.

100 photos and videos for 100 years of Machu Picchu

The road less traveled to Machu Picchu

Our first view of Machu Picchu was from across a cloud-covered valley. My daughter Betsy and I had hiked three hours in air so thick that...

It's a jungle all right in Guyana

Wary of jaguars, Wally Prince creeps around a cave formed by overhanging boulders. A few small bats drop from the rocks, flutter about and...

Chile's Atacama Desert: Otherworldly and timeless

Only four people live in the village of Machuca, 13,000 feet up in the Chilean Andes, and all of them are related to Joel Colque. Colque,...

The heart and soul of Pablo Neruda

It is said that the takeover of Chile in 1973 by Augusto Pinochet broke the heart of Pablo Neruda, the country's best-known poet.

Cartagena, Colombia: Gabriel García Márquez's inspiration, the seaport mixes Old World and New

I paused on a steamy February afternoon in Cartagena's Plaza Santo Domingo. In the square's center, tourists dined on fresh seafood and...