Hello,
Unfortunately once again in northern Argentina we received sad news from home; Lesley’s grandfather Allan passed away. Whilst his health had been poor for some time and it wasn’t unexpected (especially given he was in his mid-90s), it’s a loss and we’re sorry to be missing the funeral.
We flew from El Calafate to Iguazu Falls via Buenos Aires. There was no facility in the capital for connecting flights, so we had to walk out of arrivals and straight back into departures. The security heroes sent us away to check in the hiking poles we’d carried on the first leg, and 30 minutes later when we returned they decided Tim’s tripod could be unfolded into a weapon. Sensing Tim might actually use it on them if they blocked us again, they sensibly let us through with a warning not to carry it on next time.
Puerto Iguazu town is right near the border with Brazil. It has the frontier feel of El Chalten, but with a jungle setting and oppressive humidity. We met a guy in Bolivia who’d been mugged here. There is a slightly seedy element to a steamy outpost such as this, an impression that was reinforced when we were politely offered cocaine on the street. But who cares? Ultimately, like every other tourist we’d come to see Iguazu falls.
There are vantage points from both Argentina and Brazil, but we decided to skip the Brazilian side because getting a visa was too much of a pain in the ass. The weather was cloudy during our entire stay and constantly threatening; it meant that a moonlight tour in the park was cancelled every night we were there. Rather a shame given we had specifically timed our visit to do said tour (it is only available around the full moon).
In the end we visited the Argentinian side two days running. Despite the rather inconvenient location of this natural wonder, it really is worth the effort. We were blown away by the scale of the falls, and the National Park has done a fantastic job of building walkways to maximise the experience.
We started at the “Devil’s Throat”, a u-shaped chasm with a c.80m drop. Everything is on an epic scale, including the sound and the spray shooting into the sky. Small birds were flying between the cliffs, presumably showing off for photos.
The rest of our time was spent exploring the “inferior” and “superior” paths (lower and upper paths); we walked the latter twice. The waterfalls weren’t the only attractions; some of the wildlife included monkeys, butterflies and colourful birds (see pic).
Butterflies landed to drink the sweat off our arms (and out of our backpacks). There were also coatees, bold possum like creatures that can give a nasty bite and steal your lunch. Lesley spent some time on the superior trail either worrying about or being “chased” by them (Tim thinks the danger was a little overblown and was anyway focusing on photos). According to Lesley’s testimony, one appeared out of nowhere the second she took out a sandwich, and stalked her through a crowd of people, even crawling under the mesh walkway to pop up at the other end right behind her to try and get her food. Here is a rather large example making trouble in one of the many picnic areas; we sense their natural habitat.
This is the highlight of the inferior trail. It was pretty packed when we arrived and even more so when we left; Tim had all of five seconds to get a few shots of Lesley on her own before hordes of ravenous tourists burst into frame for their selfies. Even at this vantage point Tim (and the camera) were getting fairly wet…
…and Lesley emerged fairly soaked for her troubles. Not really a terrible thing given the humidity.
You can see the same spot in the photo below, which is looking down from one of the lookouts on the superior trail.
The superior trail lived up to its name and provided some epic views. Without overdoing it, here are some of the better pictures.
You can particularly see the full sweep of the falls in the shot below.
Tim really liked the way the water rushed around the vegetation here. When we returned the second day there was a noticeable decrease in the water level and you could see the rocks the plants were growing on.
Here is Lesley in a prime selfie spot. We had to wait quite a while to get this to ourselves.
And a close up of the view behind her. You can see some people at the top right on another platform for a sense of scale.
To wrap up; Iguazu Falls isn’t conveniently located for most itineraries, but we’re glad we included it on ours. Even in poor weather it was a sight to behold. Our next stop is, almost unbelievably for us, the final one before we start our (admittedly long) journey home across the Pacific. We’ll cover Buenos Aires in the next post.
TL
timandlesley 