Time for the beach and some sunshine, we hope. Villa Gesell here we come.

The Atlantic coast near BA is lined with beach resorts, from low key to loud and glitzy. We'd chosen Villa Gesell because until relatively recently it was known as a quiet eco retreat, a little aside from the high rise resorts elsewhere. We figured it sounded like a good balance. However, we were discussing it with the day group guide at the estancia and he laughed. He'd been to Villa Gesell several times, but didn't actually remember going. It appears that it has become somewhat of a "spring break" type place!! Oh.

This impression was reinforced on the bus journey, there was a large group of lads clearly headed out for a good time. Ho hum, I'm sure it'll be fine!

We arrived late evening and were picked up by the wife from the couple that own the hotel. She was absolutely lovely, chatting nonstop to us about our travels and about Villa Gesell. Passing down the main road it was a little bigger and busier than we'd envisaged, but looked nice all the same. At the end of the main strip the road becomes a sandy trail passing through a pretty wooded neighbourhood with little boutique hotels and holiday homes. Our hotel was in this neighbourhood, a lovely villa-style building with a dozen or so rooms, we had one of the bigger ones with a balcony. Very nice indeed and so we settled in for a relaxing week.

There wasn't a huge amount to do, but that's really what we were looking for. The main town consisted of beach front hotels and bar/cafe/restaurants along a boardwalk, a parallel road of apartment blocks and the main road of shops, bars and restaurants. Further back from the coastline were mainly holiday homes and smaller hotels. To be fair, the town is pretty much a tacky seaside resort, but with plenty of steak houses, pizzerias and ice cream parlours to keep us happy.

The beach was immense, but the weather wasn't quite warm enough and the sea was pretty rough. Good for a few walks, but we stuck to the hotel pool for sunbathing and swimming. Can't complain!

For New Years Eve most restaurants were selling all in packages and so we opted for the coolest (and most expensive) place we'd found, hoping for a fun night with the glitterati of Villa Gesell. We'd had a good meal there a couple of nights earlier.

Close but no cigar. The limited choice special menu wasn't quite up to scratch and they seemed understaffed for the number of people all eating at the same time. So much so that they seemed to forget about new year! As the clock struck midnight....well not a lot happened. Then slowly, table by table, people realised that the moment had come (and gone) and so it was kind of like a slow Mexican wave flowing around the restaurant. Not quite the Latino fiesta we were looking forward to but hey, we enjoyed the evening nonetheless.

We strolled back to the hotel whilst the town finally kicked off and fireworks and firecrackers were going off all around us. A little too close for comfort to my mind.

The 1st of January 2013 brought with it a very impressive storm, with heavy clouds like I've never seem forming a slowly advancing block of darkness across the sea and producing some pretty impressive effects in the sunlight. Which of course killed any last hopes of spending our final day on the beach.

All in all it was a bit of an anticlimactic end to the trip after all the amazing adventures we'd had. I guess it allowed us to mentally prepare for returning home, and in many ways we were by then actually looking forward to it. There's only so much adventure a couple of 30 something guys can take!

So the next day we caught a bus back to Buenos Aires and an onward taxi to the airport. The return to Europe was to be our first flight since we touched down in Cusco some 3 months earlier. We should work out how many miles we'd covered by road and sea in between times - but we haven't and so suffice to say it was a hell of a lot.

We paid to get seats at the back of the plane that were just two side by side rather than be stuck with a stranger in a row of three, only to find these seats didn't recline fully. Thanks for that KLM!

And that was that. A short lay over in Schipol - mostly spent in the duty free shop buying Christmas presents for my family (and more for ourselves) - and we found ourselves in a cold, wet and gloomy London. After almost 5 months, 7 countries and innumerable other statistics, we were home.

South America had delivered everything we had hoped for and a whole lot more - amazing sights, experiences and some fantastic people along the way. Despite being ready to come home, the reality was of course a little sad.

Not to worry, in three days time we are off to Austria for a weeks skiing! It's a hard life.