It wasn't so much that I wanted to go to Iguasu Falls as I agreed to go. Visits to Niagara Falls as a kid have left me jaded on touristy waterfalls. I was fearing waterfalls that would be magnificent, but something that one could take in within a few minutes - leaving us with plenty of free time in a town full of wax museums! I was mistaken! (Jorge wants me to emphasize this point more). First, the waterfalls are so far beyond the scale of Niagara Falls that there's just no comparison. It's funny to look at this photo on the left (which shows just one section of the falls), and realize that any one piece of them would be a landmark waterfall in any other place. The amount of water coming down the falls is mind-boggling, and equally mind-boggling is knowing that the falls have gone dr
y twice in recorded history due to droughts! And even better, the falls are situated not in an ultra-touristy town but in a gorgeous national park. An added plus was a 4km trail that "nobody takes", that turned out to end at an awesome swimming hole! The town may be touristy - it's your basic national park gateway town - but at least I didn't find any wax museums!
We arrived in Puerto Iguasu after an 18-hour overnight bus ride on a first-class bus - something every traveler should experience at least once! The seats fold down flat, like first-class airplane seats. The service includes decent hot meals, with wine, and an after-dinner digestif of champagne or whiskey. Each seat had a private TV screen with headset, for watching the on-board movies. For contrast, when we continued on from Puerto Iguasu to Salta (where we arrived today), we had 24 hours of coach class. The seats reclined, well, more than airline seats. There was food service, but we were really better off with the food that we brought ourselves. There were centralized TV screens showing movies - featuring four (yes, four!) movies about girls being kidnapped, each one worse than the previous! By the time the bus driver put on "Human Trafficking", we declared it time to sleep!
Now, we're in Salta, in the northwest corner of Argentina, where it feels like a little corner of Bolivia. Today, we visited a museum with some impressive Incan remains (the mummified remains of children of noble birth who were left high on the mountains as a sacrifice to the gods). Tonight, we're going to a pena, a show of traditional Andean music. Tomorrow, we're going to set out for a few days of exploring this beautiful area, which features stunning desert scenery, Incan villages, and a huge salt plain. Oh yes, and the town has gorgeous colonial buildings and a nice, leafy plaza.
It wasn't so much that I wanted to go to Iguasu Falls as I agreed to go. Visits to Niagara Falls as a kid have left me jaded on touristy waterfalls. I was fearing waterfalls that would be magnificent, but something that one could take in within a few minutes - leaving us with plenty of free time in a town full of wax museums! I was mistaken! (Jorge wants me to emphasize this point more). First, the waterfalls are so far beyond the scale of Niagara Falls that there's just no comparison. It's funny to look at this photo on the left (which shows just one section of the falls), and realize that any one piece of them would be a landmark waterfall in any other place. The amount of water coming down the falls is mind-boggling, and equally mind-boggling is knowing that the falls have gone dr
y twice in recorded history due to droughts! And even better, the falls are situated not in an ultra-touristy town but in a gorgeous national park. An added plus was a 4km trail that "nobody takes", that turned out to end at an awesome swimming hole! The town may be touristy - it's your basic national park gateway town - but at least I didn't find any wax museums!
We arrived in Puerto Iguasu after an 18-hour overnight bus ride on a first-class bus - something every traveler should experience at least once! The seats fold down flat, like first-class airplane seats. The service includes decent hot meals, with wine, and an after-dinner digestif of champagne or whiskey. Each seat had a private TV screen with headset, for watching the on-board movies. For contrast, when we continued on from Puerto Iguasu to Salta (where we arrived today), we had 24 hours of coach class. The seats reclined, well, more than airline seats. There was food service, but we were really better off with the food that we brought ourselves. There were centralized TV screens showing movies - featuring four (yes, four!) movies about girls being kidnapped, each one worse than the previous! By the time the bus driver put on "Human Trafficking", we declared it time to sleep!
Now, we're in Salta, in the northwest corner of Argentina, where it feels like a little corner of Bolivia. Today, we visited a museum with some impressive Incan remains (the mummified remains of children of noble birth who were left high on the mountains as a sacrifice to the gods). Tonight, we're going to a pena, a show of traditional Andean music. Tomorrow, we're going to set out for a few days of exploring this beautiful area, which features stunning desert scenery, Incan villages, and a huge salt plain. Oh yes, and the town has gorgeous colonial buildings and a nice, leafy plaza.
Un paraguas sería útil para la niebla
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