In Britain, our indigenous jig is the morris dance. No wonder people would rather head for Latin America to pick up the far sexier steps of the samba, the tango and the salsa, which originated in Brazil, Argentina and Cuba respectively.
Dancing
Dancing in Latin America doesn’t have to be a formal, Strictly Come Dancing kind of experience. Unlike the waltz or the polka, you’ll see locals sashaying their way through the same steps in local clubs.
You can book dance fanatics on dance-focused itineraries, allowing them to really hone their skills and watch professional shows. For more casual dance fans, consider a couple of days or even just a couple of hours of lessons.
Gap Adventures’ eight-day Cuba Song and Dance tour is very music focused, with group and private salsa lessons, music lessons on local instruments and time in a recording studio, plus visits to see live music in the evening. Prices start at £609.
Cox & Kings can arrange stays at the Maison Dandi Royal in Buenos Aires, which has its own tango academy and ballroom.
Also in the city, W&O Travel has a five-day tango experience including lessons, shows and bed-and-breakfast accommodation, from £670. Travel 2 offers a four-day Learn to Tango programme in the city, and Journey Latin America can organise tango lessons at a milonga, an authentic local tango hall, from just £4 for a one-hour group class.
Alternatively, Journey Latin America offers a three-night stay in Cartagena, Colombia, with private salsa classes. Colombian salsa is danced differently to its Caribbean counterpart, with a side-to-side basic step instead of the traditional forward-and-back.
Imaginative Traveller has put together dance-themed itineraries for those inspired by Strictly-type shows, including a 10-day Cuban Rhythms trip, with a salsa lesson and salsa performances interwoven with wider cultural highlights. La Samba Argentina is a five-day add-on with a private tango lesson and a tango show in Buenos Aires, plus a visit to Iguacu Falls.
Kuoni offers tango history and dance lessons in Buenos Aires, while in Rio it offers one-off samba classes as well as a five-day programme with lessons and samba-themed nights out. For aficionados, the eight-night Passion for Dance tour combines time in both cities with private tango and samba lessons, shows, and the opportunity to hit the local clubs.
Real obsessives can head to Buenos Aires in the last week of August for the World Tango Championships with Sunvil Traveller. It can organise visits to the competition, plus tango lessons and nights out in a milonga.
For something a little different, Exsus can book clients for Brazilian drumming lessons or even organise for them to learn capoeira, the indigenous dancing martial art.
Diving
There are plenty of wonderful diving spots around the Latin American coast, so travellers with a bit of extra time could choose many worse places to get their Padi certificate.
Journey Latin America recommends the idyllic Roatan Island, off mainland Honduras. With more than 15 dive shops looking for business, the courses are competitively priced.
Belize is famed for the Great Blue Hole, a 410ft-deep underwater cave filled with dramatic rock formations. Exsus recommends Victoria House, a boutique hotel with its own dive shop offering full Padi certification on beautiful Ambergris Caye.
Cooking
Alongside the recognisable enchiladas, quesadillas and tortillas, Mexico is famed for its rich and spicy sauces such as mole, a mix of chilli and chocolate, and pipien, made from pumpkin seeds. Specialities include tamales, chile rellenos and ceviche.
Gap Adventures’ nine-day Mezcal and Mole trip includes a cooking class and a visit to a mezcal (an alternative to tequila) factory in Oaxaca, a market visit and cooking class in Puebla, where guests learn to make mole, and a meal out at a famous local restaurant. Prices start from £799.
The Casa de Sierra Nevada is an Orient Express-owned hotel in San Miguel de Allende, a mountain town north of Mexico City. The Sazon is the hotel’s acclaimed cooking school, with day classes specialising in regional cuisine, seasonal ingredients and market tours. Exsus, Last Frontiers and Journey Latin America can organise stays and courses here.
Brazilian cuisine is making inroads in the UK, with restaurants popping up offering barbecue-style churrasco meats, feijoada bean and meat stew, or vatapa (shrimps in cashew nut sauce).
However, the best place to experience it is in Brazil, and specialist operator Steamond Journeys offers tailor-made foodie itineraries combining some of the country’s most famous sights with some of its favourite flavours.
An eight-day Rio and Salvador trip, including market visits, regional cuisine at speciality restaurants, cooking classes and other sightseeing experiences, starts from £1,548, excluding flights.
Peruvian food may not be as well known in the UK – and those who do know it may think it is limited to guinea pig – but the country’s cuisine is slowly being recognised. Kuoni offers a full-day Culinary Adventure in Lima from £89, including a visit to a market, cooking class, lunch and a visit to a local tavern to make pisco sour, the local cocktail.
Cox & Kings also offers culinary tours and cooking classes in Lima, plus clients can learn to brew the local Chica beer. Steamond Journeys offers a Peruvian Home Cooking day in Cusco, priced from £274.
Learning Spanish
There’s no better way to learn a language than by total immersion, so no wonder more operators are offering clients the chance to pick up a bit of Spanish.
Journey Latin America offers Spanish courses in Buenos Aires, home of the tango, in Cusco, the Inca capital of Peru, and on the Nicoya peninsula in Costa Rica, where green turtles lay their eggs in May.
Clients can stay as guests of local families which, combined with four hours of tuition each day, should mean their Spanish comes along quickly. A seven-night stay with a family plus tuition in Costa Rica starts from £477.
Tucan Travel offers five language school options: Antigua in Guatemala, Quito in Ecuador, Cusco in Peru, Sucre in Bolivia and Buenos Aires in Argentina. These offer one-to-one or group lessons for four hours a day. Accommodation is in local homestays. A seven-night stay in Antigua with tuition starts from £240.
For those with less time, Intrepid Travel offers a four-hour course in Buenos Aires from $50, which involves classroom teaching for basic words.
Riding
Argentina is particularly famed for its equestrian prowess, from its gaucho cowboys to its graceful polo players. South America’s rugged terrain looks even more beautiful when a horse is taking the strain, and ranch stays offer clients the chance to live out their cowboy fantasies.
Last Frontiers specialises in riding trips, offering long riding itineraries suited to those comfortable in the saddle and stays in estancias and haciendas across South America.
Intrepid Travel’s Rio to Buenos Aires Unplugged itinerary includes a couple of days learning to be a gaucho on a Uruguayan ranch stay. Journey Latin America offers stays at Estancia Los Potreros in Cordoba, Argentina, which is great for beginners, with a stable full of sure-footed ponies.
Also in Cordoba, Exsus can organise stays at Estancia el Colibri, which has its own polo club and offers lessons for adults and kids. Guests can watch the professionals in action at matches.
Near Buenos Aires, Exsus also books La Sofia Polo, a school offering lessons including stick and ball practice and afternoon chukkas.
Best of the rest
Surfing
Latin America is gaining recognition for its good surfing. Brazil’s huge coastline offers great breaks along its length.
Jericoacoara, on Brazil’s northern coast, is great for beginners, while nearby Malhada offers sterner challenges for advanced surfers. Book clients an eight-night itinerary in Brazil with Sunvil Traveller and they’ll get half a day of complimentary surfing lessons thrown in.
Central America has great surfing opportunities too. Exsus offers surf lessons in Costa Rica at Punta Islita, on the Pacific coast, and adventure operator Footloose (now being rebranded as Grand American Adventures) offers surf lessons as option on some of its itineraries in Mexico and Costa Rica.
Photography
Few destinations offer as much photographic opportunity as the Galapagos, so why not suggest clients hone their skills with a holiday alongside a professional.
Both Journey Latin America and Sunvil Traveller offer a special Galapagos cruise accompanied by expert nature photographer Jonathan Green. There are classes and technical advice, and the walks progress at a suitably slow photo-friendly pace!
