Land transportation between Asunción, Paraguay and Santiago, Chile
- By
- Aparna Patel
- |
- 21 Jul, 2023
- |
At the moment, Pullman del Sur offers direct connections between Santiago and Asuncion. From Santiago, they leave every Tuesday at 11am for 80.000 CLP.
Crucero del Norte also travels between Santiago to Asuncion. They leave every Monday and Friday at 11:50am. You switch buses in Cordoba, but you buy just one ticket in Santiago. The cost is 70.000 CLP or 78.000 CLP. The higher price gives you two cama (sleeping) buses, as opposed to two semicama buses.
The second bus arrives in Asuncion at 7:30am (I presume the next day).
In addition, Crucero del Norte also has a 2pm departure on Friday which I think is direct.
Source: I just asked several bus companies at the main bus terminal in Santiago.
I recently completed my bus trip from Santiago to Asunción*. Not only is it not a short trip, it is unlikely to be a direct one either!
Taking Mark Mayo’s advice, I booked my first leg from Santiago to Mendoza to make sure I got to take the route through the mountains (make sure you sit on the right side of the bus; the view is much better!).
From Mendoza, there is no direct bus route to Asunción that I could find. Instead, I had to go to Córdoba.
Now, there are direct routes from Córdoba to Asunción. However, they do not run every day. In my case, I would have had to wait for several days for the next bus. Instead, I opted for a night bus to Resistencia.
The next morning, I arrived and located a bus leaving in a couple of hours for Asunción. Mission accomplished.
So the entire trip looked like this:
Santiago → Mendoza → Córdoba → Resistencia → Asunción
Conservatively, I’d estimate that I spent about 30 hours on buses, and another 12 hours waiting in terminals. Next time, I’m flying!
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According to Busbud there are three companies that offer routes from Asuncion to Santiago. NSA, Pullman Del Sur (can recommend), and Brujula.
What I’d suggest instead is if you have time, stopping in Foz de Iguazu (for the Iguazu Falls), and in either Buenos Aires if you’re detouring, or Mendoza, just before the mountains. I highly recommend Mendoza – steak, sun, and the best wine you’ll ever drink (I wasn’t even a wine drinker before I got there).
Whatever you do, make sure to do the crossing of the Andes (Mendoza to Santiago) during the day. It’s STUNNING.
I don’t really consider this a short trip, not compared to the flight. The only real ground transport option in South America is the bus (coach). There are some domestic trains around the big cities on the eastern coast, but for most rides you have to take a bus.
I took a bus from Salta in Northern Argentina to Asunción and that took about 24 hours (including some bus changes).
I don’t think there is a direct bus from Santiago to Asunción, most likely you have to change in Mendoza and/or Cordoba.
There are several different bus stations in Santiago, make sure you go to the right one. All the big ones are close together next to the train station.
Also my bus took me as far as the Argentinian border town with Paraguay ‘Clorinda’. From therr you can take a cab, or like me walk to the border and take a local bus to Asunción which took another few hours.
If you do that, don’t go into town and try to use the foot bridge over the river into Paraguay, that crossing is for locals only. You have to go through the big border crossing out of town.
Anyways, remember you are crossing the Andes on the way which is spectacular. Some of the landscape in Northern Argentina is also nice, but if you go via Cordoba you may miss some of it.
I would say the ride takes at least two days, but you should stop in Mendoza which is really nice.
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