Private journeys through Argentina
Private journeys
across Argentina
Mendoza’s vineyards, the red rock of Cafayate, the lakes of Patagonia and the tables of Buenos Aires. Nine to sixteen days, one Travel Director from arrival to departure, and free days written into every route.
Our approach
Most Argentina itineraries move too fast
Two weeks in Argentina is usually sold as eight destinations and a dozen internal flights. You come home with photographs of airports. We build the opposite: two nights minimum anywhere worth stopping, flights timed so a travel day still leaves you an afternoon, and at least one day in every region with nothing scheduled at all.
It is a country of four climates. You should feel the difference between a vineyard lunch under the Andes, a road through red rock at 6,000 feet, a cold lake in Patagonia and a late table in Buenos Aires. That takes days, not stopovers.
Your Travel Director
One person, the whole way
The same Travel Director meets your flight in Mendoza and is still with you when you fly home. Not a different local rep in every city, handing you off at each airport. One person, for all nine days, or all sixteen. It costs us more to do it that way, and it is the part guests talk about afterwards.
They are not a third wheel. At the restaurant they disappear. At the winery they disappear. Nobody is standing at your table explaining Malbec while you are trying to have dinner. They are out in the car or at a café five minutes away, and a message away from whatever you need: a waiter who is not following you, a pharmacy at nine at night, a table that was supposed to be held.
Everything runs on WhatsApp, which is simply how Argentina communicates. Questions get answered in minutes, on duty or off.
Guide, translator, fixer, and the person who knows which road is closed. By the second week most people have stopped thinking of them as staff — which is usually the point at which their family ends up joining you at the asado.
Who you are dealing with
We are not a desk in another country
Galardon works out of Mendoza and shares its ownership with 88 Locos, an Argentine wine label sourcing across the province. We are buying from these growers, eating in these restaurants and driving these roads the rest of the year.
It shows up in small ways that matter on the day. A winemaker who stays past his own closing time. A table held at a restaurant that says it is full. A driver who knows which side of the lake the weather is coming from.
The signature journeys
Start by choosing how long you have
Every journey opens with five days in Mendoza and closes in Buenos Aires. What sits between decides the rest: high desert, Patagonian lakes, both, or neither.
Why travel with us
What a private journey actually buys you
Six things that separate a Galardon journey from an itinerary assembled at a desk in another country.
One Travel Director, start to finish
The same person meets your flight and is still there when you fly home — nine days or sixteen, not a different local rep in every city. They step away at dinner and at the winery, and stay a WhatsApp message away from anything you need.
Doors that are not open to everyone
Estates that do not take walk-ins, a table at Don Julio, a boat with no other passengers. We are in these places year round, which is why the answer is usually yes.
You will eat extremely well
A private asador in the hotel garden on night one, two Michelin-starred kitchens in Mendoza, Patagonian trout and lamb, and the best parrilla in Buenos Aires.
Regional flights, never the long drive
Mendoza to Salta is eighteen hours by road. We fly it, and time the departures so a travel day still leaves you an afternoon.
Free days written into the route
At least one day in every region with nothing scheduled. They are in the itinerary from the start, not whatever is left when the plan overruns.
Your car, your guide, your pace
No shared vehicles and no fixed departure dates. If lunch runs to four hours because the conversation is good, it runs to four hours.
Argentina
One country that never repeats itself
Vineyards under the Andes. Cactus and red rock. Cold water and old forest. A city that eats at eleven. Mendoza and Bariloche are a thousand kilometers apart and share almost nothing, which is the whole argument for staying longer.
One honest thing
You will probably only need us once
Somewhere around the fourth day it tends to click that Argentina is not complicated. Flying into Mendoza was easy. You could have taken a taxi to the hotel. There are hundreds of wineries and you could have picked your own.
Good. That is what we would like you to work out. Come back on your own next time — nobody needs a guide in Buenos Aires twice.
What a first journey buys is the first time. The language before you have any of the language. The shape of the country. The estates that do not take walk-ins, the table on a Friday night, the boat with nobody else on it. The difference between seeing Mendoza and being comfortable in it.
Do that once, properly, and the place is yours afterwards. We would rather you returned for some completely different reason, and told your friends in the meantime.
Tell us when, and who with
Tell us the month, who is coming and roughly how long you have. We will write back with a first draft of the route, the hotels and the wineries. No obligation, and never a shared vehicle.
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