This past December I had the pleasure of hiking through the Andes with Mountain Lodges of Peru. I have done plenty of hiking trips before, including the Inca Trail, but none of them presented evenings that were as pleasurable as the days. This trek was a different story, thanks to four upscale lodges situated along the route to Machu Picchu.

You can read all about it in our detailed feature, Trekking Lodge to Lodge Through the Andes Mountains of Peru. It hopefully gives you a good feeling of what this trip is like, with some photos of the great scenery you will see along the way.

I couldn’t go too deeply into the experience at the lodges themselves, but if the Salkantay Lodge were open to non-tour bookings, it would rank among the other luxury hotels in Peru we have profiled. The scenery alone is a knockout. (See this other post for a video tour.)

The other three lodges were also very comfortable though, especially considering the difficulty of getting materials to these building sites in the first place and then training local staffers to meet the demands of picky guests. They are rustic in a good design way and not a “no facilities” way. Steaming hot water, big whirlpools with a view, excellent food, a full bar, comfy mattresses, even phone and Internet access by satellite if you really need it.

When there is a notable new luxury hotel opening in Latin America, we try to get one of our correspondents in there to check it out. We recently posted a review of the brand new St. Regis Punta Mita resort, north of Puerto Vallarta in Mexico.

For many years the Four Seasons has had this beautiful peninsula to itself, but all along Punta de Mita was planned to be a multi-resort, golf, and real estate development project.

So what’s the difference in the two resorts? They can mainly be summed up as “kids” and “golf carts.” Upscale families love the Four Seasons and it shows. The resort had to build an adults-only pool (with no view of the sea) a few years back to appease couples trying to get away from the racket at the main pool. The kids’ club there is very popular. At the St. Regis, however, families aren’t the focus.

Also, you can get around this hotel fine on just your own two feet.

At 22 acres, the St. Regis is less sprawling than the Four Seasons, so you’re less likely to see golf carts whizzing around the property. This contributes to an atmosphere of appealing hushed elegance.

Don’t get me wrong: you are likely to have a lovely stay in this dramatic location no matter which of these two resorts you choose, assuming you’re prepared to drop most of your cash eating and drinking on site, far removed from Puerto Vallarta. But the key point is, now you can choose. Real the full review of St. Regis Punta Mita.

We’ve been busy posting new luxury hotel reviews for a few destinations we had not covered yet, including Oaxaca City in Mexico. We now have detailed first-person reviews up from Paige Penland, who is finishing up a guidebook on the area. (She covered Nicaragua and part of Costa Rica for us before.)

The Camino Real Oaxaca is the hotel that shows up in every magazine article about the city, and for good reasons. Parts of the historic structure date back to the 1500s and many of the rooms are as evocative as the public spaces and flower-filled courtyards.

We also provide a look around nearby Casa Cid de Leon, a former mansion that has been transformed into an inviting boutique hotel with very personalized service.

The best room in the hotel, and arguably the city, is la Bella Época. The home’s original architects took full advantage of the sweeping suite’s second-floor location with three delightful balconies, perfect for enjoying the street scene below. Light streams through large windows across the unabashedly opulent furnishings, all designed to recreate the turn of the 19th century.

The last hotel of note, Hacienda Los Laureles Hotel & Petit Spa, is situated outside the city. It takes you out of the thick of things into a peaceful restored hacienda with 23 rooms. Nice views, one of the best restaurants in town, well-tended gardens, and a pool make this a great retreat.

My last experience with the airline TACA, in Peru, didn’t start off well. Picture four gate agents and three luggage handoff points for a line stretching halfway down the Cusco terminal. It took 65 minutes to get to the front. The flight was delayed anyway, then delayed again waiting for the plane to get there from elsewhere. The 7:55 a.m. flight I’d arrived two hours early for ended up leaving at noon.

The crew tried their best though. They even gave us a sandwich and coffee at the gate to make up for it. Considering I paid $76 for the flight, I didn’t feel much of a right to be indignant.

In the air, it went fine. We got more food and a soda, which already put TACA way ahead of pricier competitor LAN. There was a business class section too, with wider seats, better food, and alcoholic beverages. The bi-lingual flight attendants were pleasant.

I had a simliar experience when I flew TACA in Guatemala, round-trip between Antigua and Flores (Tikal). They’re not perfect and you often have to do a good bit of hopscotching to get from one country in Central America to another since their hub is in El Salvador. But overall they deliver good value and make it easy to upgrade to their business class.

TACA flies three Airbus and one Embraer models that seat between 96 and 194 on their main routes. For more obscure in-country ones you could end up on something smaller. They have call centers in 25 countries and fly to nearly all the capital cities of Central and South America. TACA has flights from eight cities in the U.S. plus Toronto, but unless you’re going to Roatan you’ll probably have to make a connection in San Salvador.

See route maps and current deals at TACA.COM
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When I stayed at Casa de Sierra Nevada in San Miguel de Allende last year, there was a metal construction fence beside the swimming pool blocking off one section that was under construction. That former 1890’s house—Casa Palma—is now open, with six new suites.

Guests probably won’t even notice that this part is new, since it incorporates the same impeccable styling and details in the other rooms and suites, but here’s the official lowdown from Orient-Express:

All six suites have private patios with outdoor heated plunge pools, while the Presidential Suite boasts an outdoor living area as well as a 900 square-foot roof top terrace that has a barbeque grill, vast granite counters and a bar area, plus breath-taking views of the city center and the Parroquia.

Two suites also include outdoor showers while all of them have central air conditioning and heating, underground heated bathroom floors, oversized shower area, a copper tub, flat screen TVs and iPod docking stations.

These suites create even more options in a hotel that was already the clear top choice in San Miguel de Allende. Here’s a video tour of another suite and our review of Casa de Sierra Nevada.