Anyone that goes anywhere close to Iguaçu will hear a lot about the famous waterfalls and obviously we were super curious to go and explore what we had heard so much about, the powerful cascades, the rainbows, the butterflies, the forrest and jungle surrounding the falls...
As advised by the hostel, we took a local bus and the ride was bumpy as expected. But the bus driver was definitely more considerate and friendly than the bus drivers in Buenos Aires. (Damien's observation about the bus drivers in Buenos Aires was "They are rather formula 1 pilotes than bus drivers" I think that describes it best. They didn't really stop for passengers to get on and off the bus, it was merely a pit stop. The bus driver pulled of, whether a leg was still hanging outside of the bus, or an old granny just got on. The drivers were always in a terrible hurry, but we could not figure out why? It could not have been due to the time table, because that didn't really exist. Some times we were waiting for a bus for half an hour or more and sometimes 3 buses of the same line passed by in a row. So why all that hurry, one would ask?)
In our hiking boots we were well prepared to explore the park. It dazzled us to see people entering the park with Flip Flops. - Stupid tourists, we thought.
The park was so big, that we had to catch a bus to the starting point of the hiking trails. To our surprise, the parks path were paved, so the hiking boots were a little exaggerated -clearly we were the tourists!... :-) It was very peaceful and pretty, walking along the path and trough the thick forrest. Suddenly we had company from the inhabitants of the forrest, the Coati from the Raccoon's family.
As adorable as these Raccoon's were, there were many signs throughout the park stating not to touch or feed these animals. Now I let you guess how most people interpreted these signs. On sight of the raccoons they hurriedly searched their pockets for food to attract them. Everybody seemed to be in competition to attract as many as possible. Some people even tried to stroke them. In secret I was waiting for one of these adorable raccoons to dig her teeth deep into a stroking or feeding hand... ;-) he he, but unfortunately nothing happened.
Trough the trees we could see the waterfalls from far away. Of course we were filming and taking pictures as if there was no tomorrow and it respectively took us quite a while to get to the parks main attraction, the Garganta do Diabo in Portugese or Garganta del Diablo in Spanish (The Devil's Throat)
Once we arrived at The Devil's Throat it was clear, why it was called like that. The water cascaded in a deafening roar at the bend of the river, where the borders of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay meet.
The Devil's Throat was U-shaped, 150 meters wide and 700 meters long (!)
On the Brazilian side we could come and stand up very close to the water, whereas on the Argentina side we got completely wet. We even took a boat trip that took us under the falls. Most of the time I couldn't even open my eyes, there was water everywhere! What an experience to be in a waterfall! Damien was filming with the Go Pro, I'm super curious to see the footage.
We also saw many rainbows and butterflies on the Argentina side, beautiful! We were really happy that we visited both sides of the falls, it was definitely worth it. The only down fall was, when we visited the Argentina side it was Good Friday and the park was completely crowded. The mass of visitors was in a harsh contrast with the beautiful landscape. We enjoyed both sides, but the Brazilian side was way more tranquil and nicer to walk, so the experience was more pleasant for us, but we would definitely go to both sides again! Just check before that there are no public holidays :-)
My best-of Album from our time in Brazil
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