Today is our free day in Santiago, Chile. Sixteen people in our tour group wanted to take a day trip to Vina Del Mar and Valparaiso. These towns are right next to each other and they are two-hours bus ride from Santiago.
Our tour guide offered to take us on this tour for CHP$30,000 (USD$60). Unfortunately for our tour guide, the hotel receptionist already told us that it cost only CHP $3,000 (USD$6) for a one way bus ticket.
This morning, we took the metro (CHP$400) to the Santiago central bus station. At the bus station, a tour guide managed to convinced us to pay her CHP$17,500 (USD $35) per person for a 4-hours tour of Vina Del Mar and Valparaiso, including the round trip bus fares betwen Santiago and Vina Del Mar, all transporation in Vina Del Mar and Valparaiso, our private van and tour guide. This package is almost half the price of what we were offerd yesterday, we thought CHP $18,000 was a good deal. After a quick discussion, the group bought this package.
Unfortunately, we were wrong. At the Vina Del Mar bus station, we saw a poster for a similar 4-hours Vina Del Mar and Valparaiso tour for CHP $5,000. If we had took the bus to Vina Del Mar as we originally planned, we would have spend only CHP $11,000 (USD $22) per person instead. That would have been a 173% saving from our tour guide´s offer and 59% saving from the offer we took.
DOH!
Lesson of the day: For the best bargain, book tour for a city in that city!
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