Iguazú

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On Tuesday we visited the famous Iguazú waterfalls on the border between Brazil and Argentina. They were absolutely amazing! When we went it was comparatively dry, there was even a small section with no water at all, but it still didn't detract from the general vastness of the whole place. We got up early in the morning to catch the bus to the entrance gate where we were immediately met by hoards of tour groups, mostly very elderly, but this was what we expected to be honest and obviously we were ourselves included in the tourist category so we couldn't complain. We were advised to take the train to the viewing platforms of ´La Garganta del Diablo´ or ´Devil´s throat´ first, so we did. However we soon realsied that the extremely long queue for a train that goes at the pace of a light jog wasn´t worth it so we decided to walk the return leg. As we crossed a long network of platforms that went over the upper Iguazú River, we were puzzled as to why we couldn't here any noise. We could see people walking back from the viewing platform completely drenched, but other than this, what we were about to see was a complete surprise. Even as we began to be able to see the small u-shaped end of La Garganta with water pouring down into what looked like the big whirlpool at the end of the third Pirates of the Caribbean film, we still couldn't get a glimpse of the full force of it. Then we began to feel the spray from the clouds of water that fly up from the bottom and were then met by an incredible view of the most powerful part of the whole waterfalls. It continued down a long corridor of water to the point where it opens up and becomes normal river again. The weather was very hot so we were really glad to be getting completely soaked. After we stood for a while and admired the views we went back to the viewing platforms of the rest of the falls, just around the corner from the Devil's Throat. We first took the trail to the upper part where you could see them all from the top and then took the lower trail where you could see a whole panorama of all the falls we'd just been walking on the top of. These views were amazing. It was also from here where we took our boat trip from. This took us firstly to see views of the main section, then to the Devil's Throat, up which we went about a quarter of the way and drove under a smaller waterfall that got us completely and utterly drenched. We then went back to the main section and went right underneath the biggest waterfall there. It quite literally took your breath away because you were fully engulfed in the water. We then explored the various view points of San Martin Island and found, by crossing some dried up river, a hole in the rock that exposed some hidden waterfalls that eventually went down to the Devil's throat. That was very cool. We then went for a swim in a small beach on the side of the river, did a load of other stuff and then went back. (I'm getting pretty exhausted writing this). The whole day was just brilliant though and the views made for some amazing photos (www.tdjgidman.blogspot.com).

Now we're in Salta and will shortly be going to see the Salar de Uyuni, the world's largest salt flats in good old ´much-cheaper-than-Argentina´Bolivia.

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