“Ok, so we want to go from… the Uk to Rio de Janeiro. Then across land on the Bamba bus tour all the way to Lima (Macha Pichu) crossing Paraguay, Uruguay, Argentina, and Bolivia on the way (No of course not in that order). Then fly upwards to San Diego, driving an RV along the route squishing in California, Yosemite, the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas and a ton of American landmarks along the
way. We will then stay with our friends Jen and Glen for a bit of a rest at Christmas. Then upwards towards Calgary in Canada and our snowboarding courses on the 28th of December. After that we will fly downwards to Hawaii for a couple of weeks and then on to New Zealand. After that we will go north to Asia, catching Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia on the way. We will finally end up in Tokyo for a couple of weeks and then fly home….”

Their was a sizeable gap in conversation as the assistant manager’s eyes flickered and he said. “Well, you can’t”….

From that point onwards, the assistant manager spent time showing us many ways in which we couldn’t go to the places we wanted to. Lucy’s mind went into stasis as the work put into working out our mammothian odyssey fell down in tatters and I tried to wrestle the route back into shape. ”Not possible“, ”Unfortunately you are restricted from picking up a plane from a journey from anywhere else than the place you landed“, ”That exceeds the amount of miles you are allowed on this package“ were a few of the negatory responses the sub-manager communicated to us as the sun started to sink a little lower. Unbeknownst to me Lucy was also sinking lower internally as the dream trip was starting to slip away a little due to excessive costs. We really didn’t want to cut any of the countries short or omit them from the itinerary. As we left the travel agent, emotion was high (low). We had a drink at All Bar One and then came home. Sta Travel, I am very disappointed in you…

True to form and as a testament to her dogged determination, Lucy took control. We did the leg work and priced each individual flight ourselves. Turns out if you have the nounce, and you exude pure determination, and you go DIY, you can say screw the travel agent, its far cheaper to do it yourself. Ribsy and Lulu 1 – Sta Travel 0.