Iguazu Falls, last adventure for trip

Before we left Australia, we organized a visit and overnight stay at the Iguazu falls. The plan was to see the falls from both the Argentinian and Brazilian side. Unfortunately, it transpires, that there was a 2-day holiday for both countries, Carnaval. This meant our trip was for one day only, up in the morning back in the evening. Sounded okay on paper except it was a 4:00 a.m. start and an 8:00 p.m. flight back. Sensibly, Bob organized a private tour so we were picked up and dropped off from the hotel and we had a guide for the whole day. One minor hiccup was that we actually thought our flight to the falls was the following day, we were woken at 4:00 a.m. by the hotel telling us our driver had arrived. Momentary confusion, got dressed very quickly, grabbed what we needed and had plenty of time at the airport.

The day before we arrived it had been 45°, cooler today a mere 40. The first thing the guide asked me was did I have a hat and sunscreen. Yes to the second one no to the first so I went into one of the many tourist shops and bought a rather unflattering cloth bucket hat. I didn't keep it. The facilities generally were really good, places to refill water bottles, toilets everywhere, and of course shops to sell you everything from chips, drinks, hats to cheap souvenirs.

We had the option of three different paths we could walk. It's really impressive. Just how organized the experience is for the tourists. There are walkways everywhere and for the first walk we took a small train to the start of the walk. It was really crowded because of the public holidays. But because of the infrastructure there was only one place that I felt cramped. The first walk was to probably the most spectacular flow of water called The devil's throat. The morning was reasonably cool in the low 30s, the walk wasn't too hot or hard but it was probably about 3 km in total and when we reached the point where we could see the flow it was very crowded. It took most of the morning to get there and back. It was the waiting for the train that added to the time. We were very grateful to stop for lunch in an air conditioned restaurant.

By mid-afternoon, the temperature had reached the high 30s and the humidity also was high. Fortunately the second walk was more pleasant, less crowded and mostly in the shade but still uncomfortable. What was really striking on the second walk was just how large an area the falls cover. You really can't see all of the falls from any one vantage point. There are some 250 + waterfalls and as we walked more emerged. Our Brazilian guide suggested that the best views were from the Brazil side, that might be the case, but we weren't to know otherwise. It was a shame we couldn't see it from both sides but because of the public holiday there was a 3-hour wait at the Brazilian border making it logistically impossible.

There was also an abundance of wildlife, some definitely waiting for tourists to feed them which of course was highly discouraged. The two that hung around tourists the most were coatis, a small creature with a bushy tail like a fox and a long pointy nose, and a misnamed blue Jay. Misnamed because it's actually yellow with just a small amount of blue on its head. We saw both throughout the park. We saw several toucans flying over which was a thrill, but unfortunately only overhead, Bob did manage to photograph them. There are a range of other animals in the park which we didn't see such as cougars and jaguars, but I had no expectation that we would. In the river were a number of enormous catfish black in color the largest around 2 m in length. Earlier in the day our guide had shown me a photograph of a very small butterfly with a distinctive red marking on the top of its wings and the wings themselves look like they had numbers on them. Because of the red marking I actually spotted one and it obligingly sat very still on a leaf enabling us to get good pictures.

I had been disappointed, upset that we were not able to have more than 6 hours in Iguazu particularly when our guide said he would get us back to the airport by 3:00 p.m. and our flight was not until 8 p.m. I was not happy. By 4:00. however, we were both done in, hot and tired having walked a lot, albeit easy walking, it was still exhausting in the heat. That would have been okay if the flight had been on time but that was not the case, storms in Buenos Aires delayed our flight until nearly 9:00 p.m.. As I sat waiting, I could only think of how I would have felt if we had gone to the falls the following day. Given we were flying home the next day. I would have been stressed and worried about whether our flight was going to make it back to Buenas Aires in time. We didn't get back to the hotel until 11:30, a very long day but we were back and had a whole day to recover before needing to think about packing.

Despite all the hassles, the trip has been worthwhile, the falls really are a natural wonder and I am so glad we saw them. In my mind of the three great well-known waterfalls in the world, this is by far the most spectacular. Niagara falls are very high, Victoria falls are stunning but don't have the expanse that the Iguazu falls have.Baca lagi