Rio to Iguazu Falls, Brazil

. Rio to Iguazu Falls Brazilian Side. Guide Israel Hotel Amerian Portal del Iguazu,Argentina

The alarm went off at 4:15am, neither of us got much sleep. Up and packed and down waiting for Rodrigo by 5:15am. This morning he brought his wife with him and she drove. Don told her she was a much better driver than Rodrigo and we all had a good laugh. Not much traffic so we made it there in half an hour. We said our fond goodbyes; he was so good to us. We checked in, paid for our luggage and had time to have a fruit salad cup. Our plane departed at 7:05am and we were only served cookies and a drink enroute.

We landed at 9:20 at the Foz do Iguazu airport where we met our guide, Israel, and his driver. We loaded our luggage and headed off for a drive through the Iguazu National Park. Vehicles are not allowed to go faster than 45 Km per hour to protect the animals from being hit. We drove for about an hour before we reached the location where we would enter the trail that would take us on a mile-long hike above the lower Iguazu River to see the series of 275 individual cascading falls on the Argentina side, that ended at the Devil’s Throat.

Iguazu Falls are on the Iguazu River, on the border of the Argentine province of Misiones and the Brazilian state of Paraná. Together, they make up the largest waterfall in the world. The falls divide the river into the upper and lower Iguazu. The Iguazu River rises near the heart of the city of Curitiba in one of the southern provinces of Brazil, Parana. For most of its course, the river flows through Brazil; however, most of the falls are on the Argentine side. Below its confluence with the San Antonio River, the Iguazu River forms the boundary between Argentina and Brazil. The name "Iguazú" comes from the Guarani or Tupi words "y" meaning "water", and "ûasú "[waˈsu], meaning "big". [Legend has it that a deity planned to marry a beautiful woman named Naipí, who fled with her mortal lover Tarobá in a canoe. In a rage, the deity sliced the river, creating the waterfalls and condemning the lovers to an eternal fall.
In Argentina Jose Gregorio Lezama was the first owner of this land and, considering them of barely no value, sold them at a public auction using a sign that read “rainforest area surrounded by many waterfalls”.

The following owner, Domingo Ayarragaray, developed it a bit further by building a hotel and roads so that visitors could see the waterfalls, and he also exploited local wood resources until President Hipólito Yrigoyen's Argentinian Government acquired the land and declared it a national park. With one of the most spectacular waterfalls in the world, the Iguazu Falls on the Brazilian side was the second Brazilian National Park to be created in 1939. This part of the largest remaining Atlantic Forest of southern Brazil, protects a rich biodiversity, consisting of representative species of the Brazilian fauna and flora, some of which are threatened with extinction, such as jaguar, puma, broad-snouted caiman, purple parrot, harpy eagle as well as many other species of great value and scientific interest. The park protects the entire basin of Floriano river, an affluent of the Iguaçu River.
The total area of the park is over 1000 hectares, around 300 kilometres are natural borders by rivers and falls between Brazil and Argentina and comprise a total of 600 hectares of protected areas. Both countries maintain this equally. The rest of the park is 400 hectares of primeval forests.

The Iguazu Falls in Brazil extend a semicircular front of 2,700 meters long. The view is amazing. 800 meters are on the Brazilian side and 1,900 meters on the Argentine side. They are composed of a variable number of falls ranging between 150 and 270 meters. The falls have names like Floriano, Deodoro, Benjamin Constant, but the most famous is the Devil’s Throat Falls. The Devil's Throat canyon is 90 m wide and 80 m deep. Right of this canyon, another part of the river forms 160-200 individual falls, which merge into a single front during flood stage. The width of the total falls is 2.7 kilometers.
A comparison of the three largest falls in the world:
Iguazu Falls - 82 metres high and 2700 metres wide,
Victoria Falls Africa - 108 metres high and 1708 metres wide,
Niagara Falls - 51 metres high and 1203 metres wide.
In terms of flow rate, Iguazu is 62,000 cu ft/second. (The Amazon is 7,400,000cu ft/second)

Israel lead us along the path and right from the start we could see walls of falls pouring over the cliffs. As we walked along, we began to get an idea of just how vast the area was. There were lots of colourful butterflies among the rainforest trees and some even came and landed on us. About halfway along the path there was a snack bar and we bought enough to keep us going for the afternoon. We saw several Coatis near the snack bar looking for handouts or crumbs dropped. They are very much like our raccoons and are scroungers around people. Because I was taking so many pictures, we took quite a long time to reach the Devil’s Throat Falls at the end. We stood on the jut out areas marvelling at the pounding of the water right in front of us, getting well dampened by the mist. We took our time taking in all the impact of the water pouring over and then took an elevator to an observation deck for a spectacular panoramic view of the falls. We walked back up to where our car and driver were waiting, to take us on the rest of our journey.

We crossed the border from Brazil to Argentina and made our way to our hotel. We checked in and went down to see if we could find something for a late lunch. We were shown out to a patio and ordered a light lunch with lemonade. It was lovely to sit in the shade and talk about all we had seen at the falls. We found out that there was a tour group staying at the hotel and would be taking over most of the dining room for dinner. We decided to find out where else we could eat and were given the name of a restaurant, Boca Mora, that we could walk to very easily. The weather was perfect for a dinner outside overlooking the Iguazu river. We ordered a fish dish that was very good. Near the end of our meal a band set up in a park just across the water and we just sat and enjoyed our wine and music. A pleasant stroll back along the quiet streets and right to bed.Read more