In Paraguay......

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After crossing the border into Ciudad de Este, we had a quick look at the town. There were street venders everywhere and hundreds of shops selling (dodgy??) electronic goods. We didn’t stay in town long, it was off to the bus station where we caught a bus into Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay.

No lunch and a couple of hours into the trip, with little scenery except for farmlands, my stomach is in pain. To make matters worse, at many of the stops people were getting on the bus with yummy smelling chippas for sale (chippas are made from flour, egg and cheese, and are really yummy when warm and fresh). Jeff and I were starving, but had to suffer for hours because we had no local currency. I guess it was a silly idea to hop straight on a bus (it was my idea, I admit it). Anyway we arrived late at night and finally changed some money over, stuffed our faces full of chippas and tried to get our head around this funny money (its strange when you have bills for 100,000). Feeling better we hopped on a local bus to get to the city center and find somewhere to crash. The bus was a retro looking thing with 80´s pop cranked up loud. I don´t think that they had ever seen tourists before (let alone with backpacks) judging by the way they were staring at us. Anyway we found a cheap and central hotel and settled in for the night. The hotel was good, except for the roof collapsing the next day. I suppose you get what you pay for. The funny part was we told the people in the hotel, all they did was sweep up the debris and tell us it was fine. Only after the major roof collapse did they move us to another room.

We spent a couple of brief days in the capital, its really cheap and tourist are almost non-existant. The locals are friendly too. We had a funny conversation with a “manager” (as he proudly pointed out) wearing a flash suit and his flashy wife…. As usual, the first question was ¿Americanos? (And always said with suspicion)… when you reply … “No, Australianos” they begin to talk. Apart from the usual chit-chat about how much people earn in Australia, they wanted to know ¿Why are your tourists in Paraguay? They were surprised we were there; I guess it was because not a lot of tourists pass through there.

After many, many chippas, we caught a bus into Buenos Aires, Argentina.

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Photos

Asuncion, Paraguay
One of the important government buildings in Acuncion.

Chippas..... Yumm!
This is me eating one of the famous chippas which are all over Paraguay... and dirt cheap! They are made from flour, egg and cheese. Yum!

More of Asuncion
Another building in Asuncion.

The Roof In Our Hotel Room
This was taken before it got worse!