Blogs from Misiones, Argentina, South America - page 7

It was a rough (and long) trip from YYZ -ATL - EZE - AEP - IGR. But after a bunch of airline-driven drama and stress that I won't delve into (however will say that I will notbe flying Delta again), I started off my trip at one of the top sights on the entire continent of South America -- Iguazú Falls. As an Ontarian that has been quite familiar with Niagara Falls since I was a youth, I wasn't prepared for the grandiose scale of Iguazú. In fact, in late 2011, Iguazú Falls was announced as one of the seven winners of the New Seven Wonders of Nature. The many cataratas (falls) border Brazil at the north-east corner of Argentina. And when I say "many", I mean many. Like 275 individual falls!! And the grand master ... read more

If there is one crazy week-end to travel in Argentina, it is Semana Santa. On top of that, the next Tuesday is a public holidays...in honour of losing the Malvinas War 30 years ago...and to make things easier, the government, has given Monday off too. For info, Argentina is running high the last three years as the country with the highest number of public holidays...a lot of them just given out by the current government...don't try to ask to speak of effiency here! This means people are off from Wednesday evening to Tuesday evening....that's even better than Chinese New Year...so they are all heading out...well, when they can afford it. To start well....Buenos Aires was a full traffic jam and I knew we would never reached our bus on time...so instead of ruining the all week-end, ... read more

16th March ’13 Brasil to Argentina Once again it was very bizarre to leave our hotel in Brasil and just outside catch a bus to Argentina! Luckily when we checked out the lady on the desk spoke great English and explained to us the border crossing process. Basically we caught the public bus but had to tell the driver to drop us at the Policia National (border post), he then gave us a white slip which meant once we had been stamped out of the country we just had to wait for the next bus of the same line to come along and we didn’t have to pay again – great system. There was hardly anyone at the border post so we were soon stamped out and sat at the bus stop waiting for the bus ... read more

Early in the mourning after having something for breakfast nearly everybody at the hostal was eager to catch the bus to " Cateratas". The waterfalls are approximately 30km from the town.The bus takes about 30 to 40 minutes and they charge you 30pesos eachway. Very efficient survice running every 20 minutes. Non - South Americans pay 135 pesos for entry to the natural reserve.Since I had opted for the Grand Voyage Tour, me along with people who had selected the same tour, were first given a guided tour of the rain forest through a designated track, on a truck, converted to carry people on top safely. A bilingual guide explained things about the forest, its flora and fauna. As expected we saw a lot of giant spiders and thousands of butterflies, one or two toucans, a ... read more

On the evening of January 2, we departed Buenos Aries on a Via Bariloche bus for what was supposed to be a 17 hour ride. We should have arrived in Puerto Iguazú by 12:10pm, which I had hoped would give us enough time to see the Brazilian side of the falls that afternoon. But we didn't arrive until a few hours later, and by the time we had checked into our hotel and had a bite to eat, we decided lack of time dictated we should just focus on the Argentinian side the next day. We probably could have taken a taxi over to the Brazilian side to save time spent on a bus, etc. I had read the Brazilian side offers a better panaramic view, and while it has a nice restaurant (Porto Canoas) isn't ... read more