Iguazu Falls and Curitiba

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We got into Puerto Igazu at about noon on Wednesday and caught a 12:40 bus to the falls. I could spend ages describing how unbelieveable they were, but you probably wouldn't believe me....... (that's stupid). Look at the photos instead. We spent most of the afternoon there, got a bus back to Puerto Igazu, grabbed our bags and headed over to Brazil.

My Finnish (EU) passport paid off well at the crossing, no $160 visa for me!! Border control actually consisted of the bus driver asking anyone if they needed their passports stamped, we would have missed it if we weren't paying attention. We got the bus at 9pm and got into Curitiba at about 7am in the morning.

Clare (a friend from when I worked at Bear Valley Ski Resort in the US) picked us up from the terminal and we spent the next few days at her place. While in Curitiba we went to a Churrascaria, otherwise known as a Brazillian Steakhouse. For 15 Real, or about US$5, we ate as much spit roasted meat (it seemed like there was endless variety) as we could handle and then some more. Between servings I think they brought out roast veges, but I can't remember eating any. They also had peeled pineapples that they had spit roasted with cinnamon. I did eat that, it was amazing stuff. I think Lundy still has nightmares about how he was feeling after that encounter which so much meat.

We next headed up to Sao Paulo to spend a night with Karina (Bear Valley as well) and her family. We wished we could spend a few more days looking around the city but we were on such a tight schedule. It was great to catch up anyway and see photos.

We also didn't get to stop in Rio, only enough time to take a photo of the Cristo Redentor (the famous statue of Christ on the mountain) from the bus station and then get a taxi out to the airport. The flight we had went from Rio to Sao Paulo (yes, it's stupid that American Airlines wouldn't just let us get on in Sao Paulo) and then up to New York City.

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Photos

Vertigo
This was just one of the smaller falls on the way out to the main attraction, very impressive.

Getting up close and personal
The amount of water spray in the air was unbelievable, we were pretty soaked by the end of the day. These are the same falls as above.

More of the same
This was out closer to Gargantua del Diablo, or the Devil's Throat. I wasn't really game to get my camera out there because huge clouds of spray would wash over us at seemingly random intervals.

Brazil!!
That's Brazil on the other bank, apparently the viewing is much better though from the Argentinian side were we were.

Glad we went in November
From November to March is their wet season, so I'm pretty sure that you don't get much more water going over than while we were there, we got lucky. The boardwlak runs along the top of these falls.

Panorama
I just stiched this together with photoshop, it looks like it's from a Robinson Crusoe movie or something.

Rio
This is as much as we got to see of Rio way to tight a schedule that we were on. On the hill to the left of the sign is where the famous statue of O Christo Redentor, or Christ the Redeemer is.