Paraguay: Asuncion

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A few of us took a bus from Argentina to Paraguay before the rest of the group in order to sort out my Brazil visa issues. The Brazilian Embassy in Bolivia refused me a visa because my bank statements didn´t have my name on them, just my account number. No amount of explaining that my bank does that for security reasons was going to make them issue me a visa. So I created some statements with my name on them ready for my next visa attempt. Yesterday I applied for the visa at the Asuncion Embassy armed with my bank statements and they didn´t even ask for them. I couldn´t even give them away! And instead of a 48 hour turnover, my visa was ready to pick up in three hours. So that allowed more time by the hotel pool -- it´s 30C at 10pm here -- and shopping at the Mercardo de Jennifer Lopez as we´ve come to call it (the shopping centre has the word ´Lopez´ in it but when we ask the taxi driver to take us to Mercardo de Jennifer Lopez they seem to know where to go). The hotel we´re staying at is beautiful. Again, a step up from anything Tucan has put us in. They´re getting one hell of a complaint letter from me considering I spent $6000 on this tour and have spent half of it organising alternate accommodation to the appalling campsites they´re sticking us in. To make things worse, when the others freecamped on the side of the road two nights ago, two of the women had strange men enter their tents and attempt to take off with their bags. Glad I´m safely in a hotel....with a pool and hot shower.

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