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Published: January 4th 2017
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Time to say good bye to one of my favourite citys, will I ever get Duran Duran's song out of my head. We fly out of Santos Durmond which isn't far away so we had a bit of a sleep in before packing up and checking out. Next stop, Foz du Iguacu the step off point to the world heritage listed falls of the same name, we arrived in the rain making our way to our hotel. We have a few English channels so after visiting the supermarket we watched a bit of TV before bed.
The next morning dawned clear if muggy and we walked the short distance to the bus station boarding a bus to the Iguacu falls national park arriving roughly 40 minutes later. We paid the entrance fee and boarded the bus to the falls, the crowds here are huge and it impacts negatively on the experience for me, this is my first great water fall and I have to put up with thousands of inconsiderate people. Apart from the stunning power of the falls we were lucky enough to spot thirteen Coati and two armadillos.
We then walked a short distance down the road
to the nearby bird park which turned out to be one of the best of its kind I have ever visited. I saw a number of species for the first time including two species of Toucan that started chewing on my boot. The park had some caiman, anacondas and a few mammal species as well.
New years eve tonight and the fireworks were going off long before dark unfortunately for revellers a big tropical storm put a dampener on celebrations.
Early the next morning we packed up and crossed the border into Argentina, it was painless this time and we arrived at at our new hotel before 10am. Immediately after checking in we returned to the bus station to arrange tickets to Posadas on the border with Paraguay. It was then time to head out to the Argentina side of Iguazu falls, the crowds here where much less and as a result we had a more pleasant experience.
The falls on this side are more spectacular as are the Coati who will take on any one for a feed, we also saw some huge cat fish, a deer, turtles and a number of bird species.
The
next day was devoted to an terribly long bus ride to Posadas, 300km taking more than 7 hours, and the border crossing into Paraguay. We were scammed by a dodgy taxi driver and ended up walking through the border before bussing it across the bridge over the Rio Paran. Finally we arrived at our hostel in the pleasant Paraguayan city of Encarnacion.
The next morning we went out to visit two World heritage listed Jesuit missions, the Jesuits arrived in the 16th century to convert the native Guarani people, but were later expelled by the Spanish casting the natives into slavery.
The structures are built in red stone and reminded me of the temples around Ayuthaya in Thailand, the churches at both sites were quite ornate even though they have been ruined for centuries. Both Ruth and I felt both sites to be well worth the effort time visit.
In the evening we visited the restaurants along the river promenade witnessing a stunning sunset over the river before returning to the hostel to cool off and relax before our walk to the bus station for our 12.30am bus to Asuncion.
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D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
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