Iguazu Falls

We just got back from Iguazu Falls today. It was brutally hot... just when you thought Buenos Aires is hot enough! I can´t believe it´s only ¨subtropical¨there, and the temperature is actually just about 32C (90F). Back in San Jose, temperature breaks 100F in summer easily, but the heat was no where near this. Humidity plays a big role! It makes hot hotter and cold colder.

Iguazu Falls are spectacular. Even First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt reportedly exclaimed "Poor Niagara! upon seeing it! It´s the world´s widest fall, only rivalled by the Victoria Fall in South Africa (which is the ´widest´fall). It split into about 270 discrete falls. Together they provide a stunning panaromic view. We visited on a clear day, the rainbow, the butterflies, the deadening sound and the vapors around it is just stunningly beautiful. I stared it and got completely soaked for minutes! It´s so huge, you even need to take a train or a boat ride to reach the other end of the falls. And the plume from the falls can be seen from miles away!

another exciting part of the trip is now I can say Ï´ve been to Brazil!¨. Okay so i didn´t really ¨visit¨Brazil, I just crossed the border to the other side of the fall, without a visa! This is huge because people who know a little bit about my trip planning know I had a HARD time obtaining visas. So that makes this feel like a freebie. First we went to the Brazil consulate in Iguazu. They told us it cost $72 pesos for Taiwanese and we can get it ¨maybe¨today or tomorrow. So we went to take photos and filled the form, when we came back, he changed his statement and pointed us to a line in a deck of documents that says $108, which makes the total cost $180 pesos (US$60). After we repeately asked him what´s the extra cost, he didn´t really answer us and seemed annoyed and so do we! So we walked away and on the way back we were stopped by a taxi driver who aassured us that I can go across the border with no problem. He´ll take us there for $150 pesos. that sounded pretty good, just not very legal. So we hesitated again. After much consideration, the next day we went to a registered taxi company and explained the visa situation and asked them if they´ll take us. Then they told us öf course, all you need to do is to pay the police $60!¨. wow deal! no wait, no visa, just $60, i will do it! so we hopped in the taxi and the whole process was very smooth, and very legal (at least it seemed like!). We arrived at the border, there´s a window where all the taxi drivers lined up to show documents, our driver handled everything for us. So we did not exact see whether he slipped the money through the side of the window or otherwise. what matters is we crossed the border okay and saw the spectacular falls from the other side. It was wonderful and Brazil does look a little greener than Argentina.

About our accomodation, we stayed at a really really nice hostel. It has a pool, hammocks, bbq, internet access, and a common area where guests can sit, relax, and often exchange travel stories. We met some interesting people here, people who have been on the road for months and have tons of tips for us. On one hand we were happy about it, on the other hand it makes feel like such spoiled rats! Those people take buses through south america, they stayed on buses for 20+, 30+,40+ hours, they camped and cooked their own meal. We eat at parilla everyday and flinched at the 18 hours bus ride from Buenos Aires. Okay so i guess we can´t really call ourselves backpackers yet until our first overnight bus ride. And at this point i feel really grateful that years of working as engineers have given us some financial cushion, so we can afford a bit more comfort than the typical backpackers. so thank you cisco!

advise? try not to come in summer and use mosquito repellent religiously!!

some pictures here.

this photo is shot on a boat. We took a boat ride to have close encounter to the falls. The results is us competely soaked. I was screaming like crazy when the water was pouring down. The adrenaline rush is no less than the jurassic park ride in Disney land.

man don´t I look sun burned?!

the common area in our hostel.

we dined at this restaurant THREE times during our 4-night stay at Iguazu. It´s easy to tell how much we are anticipating the food from Pascal´s face.

We are back at Buenos Aires now, tomorrow we´ll fly to Patagonia where cold weather will be very welcome. We are prepared - we bought two boxes of alfajores from Havanna with us. One to be consumed while trekking in Patagonia and the other to be brought on board the Antarctica cruise so we always have something handy to boost our energy. chao!