Iguazu too

A fire truck we saw at Iguazu. These are beautiful old machines.


One night while in Iguazu, we ventured out to "Hito" which is known for it's fantastic view of the confluence of the Rio Parana and the Rio Iguazu. Hito refers to the point on the land. The picture shows what looks like a bend in a river but it is in fact a 'T' intersection. The left hand river, running from the far background is the Rio Parana intersecting with the Rio Iguazu in the pictures' foreground. So, from this point, you can see Brazil directly across where the building is and to the left, you can see Paraguay. Kind of a neat intersection of three countries. The interesting thing about Paraguay is that no one we talked to recommended going there. We had heard this from Brazilians and Argentinians. They said there were some safe places to visit but that all in all it wasn't worth the effort. The Brazilian people we met, while in BA suggested that the part of Brazil close to Paraguay was in fact the best part of Brazil. Brooke and I would enjoy going there and I think would consider it in the future.


On our second visit to the falls, we enjoyed the company of our favourite information girl, Maria, who was so happy to see us again. She even had a card for us to stay in contact and wondered if we would like to go for drinks while we were still there. We of course did make it out for drinks with her, her husband and their little boy. When we first spoke with her, we thought she was quite young. She had a tiny frame and youthfulness to her. Then as we conversed, we discovered that she had two children, one eleven and one five. It was difficult not to let our jaws drop. I honestly thought she was much younger than us. When we went out, they were unable to get a baby sitter for their five year old so he just came along. We met them at a park at night which was crawling with people yet it had the complexion of a rough looking area. Once again, in Argentina, people stay out so late that there is safety in numbers. We sat in this little area where there was an ice cream shop and a snacks and beer shop. Their son just played and wandered around while we talked. There were in fact many children just playing here and there while their parents socialized. We were out till 2:00am! This sort of easy going situation would never happen at home. The crazy liquor police would first arrest you for having liquor near children and out in the open air without being fenced in and secondly, no one would go out and take their kids with them. The kids were well behaved in my opinion, perhaps because they were accustomed to this. There was a lot to talk about with them. Maria and her husband Rodrigo taught English in Iguazu which they had learned when they had lived in the U.S. for quite a few years. They lived in Aurora, just north of Denver. Maria had one of her sons there. What makes this story ever more interesting is that this is the very same town where Brooke was born.

I think we will try and keep in touch with them as they were a wonderful couple and had so much spunk and enthusiasm.



Eventually, Brooke and I had to leave our wonderful little paradise and we packed our bags and waited around our hotel discussing how we had made a poor choice in flight times leaving Iguazu. We were to leave at 2:00 which left us with neither a day in BA or a day in Iguazu, just a day splintered in two by a flight aboard a cramped plane. We left the hotel with what was ample time as we wanted to make sure we had over an hour at the airport to get through security etc. You have to remember that this is a small airport though and doesn't require any time running around. When we arrived at the airport however, it was like a ghost town. How did we get so lucky that there was almost no one there? We strolled up to the check in counter and told the attendant that we were there for our flight. She looked quizically at us as if we were on drugs. She took our passports and looked at her computer for a few minutes. Then she asked if we had any paper work. Then, she broke it to us that we had been moved to the earlier flight. Aerolineas Argentinas, the truth is we wish we had left you, all of those wild flights, those wild schedule changes, you never kept your promise.
We were apparently notified via an email account that brooke had been unable to access in Argentina. In the end, she offered getting us on the next flight, at 6:00pm. Anyway, our day was shot but we enjoyed pizza and wine at the airport while watching tv shows on the laptop. It turned out to be pretty fun in a funny kind of way.