Iguazu Falls

December 2nd
Well we had a lovely bus ride from Buenos Aires to Puerto Iguazu (the Argentina side of the falls)! We decided to upgrade to the nicer seats for the long ride which were nice and big and reclined 160 degrees! We got served a snack, beverage, dinner and wine, tea with cookies, and even champagne at 11:00 pm! That's a lot nicer than most flights you get!

We got to Puerto Iguazu in the morning and after a quick stop at the tourist information booth we set off to find a hostel since we hadn't booked ahead. 10 meters down the road we were dripping with sweat. It was SO humid! Once we finally found a hostel, we couldn't check in yet so instead of showering we had a quick jump in the pool, and immediately headed off to see the the Argentinian Iguazu Falls! We caught a bus to the park, where you just pay your entrance fee and then explore on your own. Fueled up with some empanadas and then we started by hopping on the train that drops you off to walk down a big bridge over the river, which was about a km long and had really cool scenery. The river was shallow here so it looked a lot like wetlands. The bridge brings you to a lookout of the 'Garganta del Diablo' fall (the Devils Throat). It's the biggest one, and it was totally breathtaking. Unfortunately, the sky opened up and a thunderstorm started as soon as we started taking pictures! Ah well, we were wet from sweat anyways, it was almost nice to cool off haha. We headed back on the train and then started the 'lower circuit' trail. It was a nice hike through the jungle, with a bit of wildlife along the way, like coati, monkeys, lizards, iguanas and even a tucan! The trail brought us past two more beautiful waterfalls, Lanusse and Alvar Nunez. They were gorgeous but we hurried along and made it in the nick of time to get the boat across to San Martin Island. The island had a nice beach and we hiked up to all the different lookouts on it, it's cool to see falls you were just standing beside, from the other angle. A quick boat ride back and we finished the lower circuit off. We then got a little turned around in attempts to get to the upper trail, but that's okay, saw more of the park that way like the lighthouse and hotel. We eventually got onto the 'upper circuit' trail. Again, more hiking through the forest, and then six or seven more lookouts of falls, these lookouts were up almost on top of the falls looking down, a whole different vantage point than the lower circuit. Some of the falls on this trail were: Dos Hermanos, Chico, Bossetti, Adan y Eva, Gpeque Bernabe Mendez, and Mbigua. After the lower circuit, we had pretty much covered it all, and in about 4 hours only! We got on the bus back exhausted from the long night of bussing and then the long day of waking, grabbed some dinner on the way back to the hostel, had a quick swim and went to bed excited to see more the next day!

December 3rd
This morning was a little hectic running around trying to book tickets and hostels for the next leg of our journey, and figuring out how to get across the Argentina-Brazil border properly. But we managed to do both and by 10:30 we were off for Brazil! It was another very humid day. Once at the falls we stored our backpacks in a locker at the entrance and figured out how to get to the bus terminal in Brazil at the end of the day. To get closer to the falls we took a 15 minute bus and then started the "Path to the Falls" trail. From even a few feet down the trail we could tell it was going to be amazing views! It was really cool to see the same waterfalls as yesterday but this time from a distance. It was much easier to appreciate just how big they are! We stopped a lot along the trail to take pictures and admire the view. The real highlight was at the end of the trail where a boardwalk takes you right out to the edge of a waterfall liking straight into the Devils Throat. It was more than 180 degree view of the immense falls. Definitely breath taking! After admiring them for quite some time we took an elevator up to a viewpoint of the falls. After that it was back to collect our bags. We successfully navigated two city buses to get us to the bus terminal with plenty of time to spare. Off to our next destination - the Pantanal!

-Lisa and Court

Pictures
1-Brazil
2-Argentina
3-Argentina
4-Brazil
5-Argentina
6-Brazil
7-Brazil