In January, we start in Bolivia.

Arrive in the low-altitude commercial capital of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, then work our way upwards in elevation to the Altiplano via the picturesque Sucre, Potosi and
ultimately the world-famous salt flats of Uyuni. From there to La Paz, the otherworldly capital city with a cable car system for a metro, Lake Titicaca (highest navigable lake in the world), Yungas Road of death and ultimately back to Santa Cruz for a direct flight to Asuncion in Paraguay.

We start in Paraguay with a visit to the Mennonite colonies in the Chaco (Filadelfia, Loma Plata and Neuland), where they started with nothing in the hot and hostile bush in an area with no fresh water and built a hugely successful agricultural operation entirely reliant on captured rain water.

Visit Asuncion, the nearby San Bernadino for a ride on the lake and Caacupe. Then work our way down to Encarnacion (Paraguay’s beach town), on to Colonias Unidas (modern German settlements of Hohenau, Obrigado and Bella Vista) and the Jesuit mission ruins. From there, to Ciudad del Este to tour the biggest hydro dam (measured by year-round output), Itaipu Binacional.

Cross the border to Iguazu in Brazil, where we visit one of the world’s two most majestic waterfalls (the other being Victoria Falls in a future trip), with boat, chopper and road.

A pre-tour in the Pantanal wetlands of Brazil may be arranged if sufficient interest. This would then connect by road into Bolivia.