Four countries answer to one figure, and you can reserve a $3,420 vacation package here

The $3,420 rung, and the three or four departures standing on it

Everything below is priced at $3,420 a head with two of you sharing a room. They are set out in no order of merit, because there is none to give.

Four places that share a price and nothing else

Ethiopia is ten nights on an escarpment of eroded pinnacles, most of it above eleven thousand feet. Nepal is twelve nights on terraced ridges below very large mountains, walked at village pace. Taiwan is nine nights, a marble gorge inland and a coast where the mountains stop in the Pacific. Chile is ten nights on Chiloe, with wooden churches, stilt houses and weather that changes hourly. Put like that, the four have almost nothing to say to each other. Two are walked most days. One is thin, cold air; one is wet at any hour of any month. The office does not tell people which to take. It keeps no ranking and names no favorite, because these are four unrelated propositions written with the same number. Tell the office your month and how much walking you want, and it will describe how each one actually runs.

What $3,420 does not reach

This figure does not reach Rwanda, Madagascar or Oman. Those three sit on the next rung, at $4,190, and most of the gap is ground transport, permits and park fees. That is a fact about the list, not an invitation to spend more. It does not reach Guyana, Alaska or the Yukon either, which are further up again. Inside $3,420 the limits are ordinary ones. Rooms in the Ethiopian highlands and the Nepali foothills are simple, because that is what exists there. A domestic flight is included only where the alternative is two days in a vehicle. International flights sit outside every figure on this site. The office arranges no carriage by air or by sea and holds a contract with no carrier. Meals are partial and the confirmation says which ones. Single occupancy costs more, and the operating company quotes it. None of that is a complaint about $3,420; it is simply what the number covers.

Deposits run from ten percent to the whole amount

On this rung the deposits cover the whole spread. Taiwan asks ten percent at reservation. Chiloe asks twenty five. Nepal asks fifty. Ethiopia asks the full amount up front, because the highland operator reserves park entry, scouts and mules months ahead and pays for them then. The operating company sets that share, not this office. Nothing is billed at this end. This desk keeps no card details and runs no checkout page. You send a request; the office puts the reservation to the operating company; that company confirms in writing and bills you directly. It pays this office a commission afterwards, once you have traveled. Nothing is held until that confirmation arrives, with a price, a deposit due date and a cancellation deadline in it. Read those terms before you send money anywhere. They differ by company and by season.