Córdoba to Iguazú Falls

After leaving Buenos Aires we went to Córdoba, which is the 3rd biggest city in Argentina. It has been named the cultural capital of the americas and has 7 universities, so it was a pretty interesting town. Unfortunately we tried to explore all the churches and museums on Monday, and for some reason they were all closed. We did have a nice walk around the bustling city though. After a couple days in Córdoba we headed north to a smaller town called Posadas. This is where the tip of the jungle begins. I think we might have been the only tourists in the city, but we had a really nice, relaxing day in this town. They had a wonderful, long walk-way by the river that many people were running and biking on. Across the river is Paraguay; we wanted to go visit that city, but as US citizens we needed a visa and had to pay $65. After Posadas we continued north to Puerto Iguazú, Argentina, which is where the Iguazú Falls are located. This town is very small with about 34,000 people. It is uniquely positioned with one river running on the west side of town bordering Paraguay, and another river running on the north side of town bordering Brazil.

An ornate church in Córdoba.

Beth and I eating at the biggest all-you-can eat buffet in Argentina, which was in Córdoba. It was $7.50 per person, and they had a huge selection of food. Unfortunately their international cuisine was lacking a little.

When booking tickets to leave Córdoba we accidently bought seats for a first-class luxury bus. It was the best bus ever!! It had huge seats, plenty of leg room, flat screen TVs, all you can drink liquor and soda, and food service.

Paraguay across the Rio Paraná from Posadas.

The bridge connecting the two countries.

This is Brazil on the other side of the river from Iguazú. It costs US citizens $100 to go into Brazil, and we need to apply for a visa in advance. So we are not going there either.

Tyler sitting in our hostel room.

The teachers and parents of Puerto Iguazú blocked the only road in and out of the city to protest the conditions of their schools. This was the morning we were trying to get to the falls, which are located 18km outside the town. We were able to walk around them in the morning, but we had to walk for 30 minutes or so before a bus was able to come and pick us up on the other side. The black smoke is from them burning tires.

The line of vehicles waiting to get into town was really long.

We finally made it to the falls, and this is approaching the Garganta del Diablo (The Throat of the Devil).

This is it! It is enormous!!!

The mist from the waterfall.

There it is again.

There are upper and lower falls, and these were the lower falls. They are a lot calmer.

Tyler, Beth, and I.

The line of lower waterfalls.

Nick looking sexy.

The front view of the Garganta del Diablo.

A rainbow in the falls.

Nick aka "Barbaroja"-RedBeard (that is what he wants to be called now) in front of a waterfall.

A GIANT ant!!! He was like 3/4 of an inch long. I would hate for him to bite me!!

A coati, which is a tropical raccoon. They were big beggers. I saw one try to climb up a man´s leg to get food.

A lizard rocking out.

A turtle getting on his rock to sunbathe.

One of the million beautiful butterflies!

Another butterfly.

An amazingly blue bird.

Huge Bamboo.

A group of ants trying to move a centipede over a root.

A guinea pig type rodent.

After leaving the park and returning to the town we discovered the protesters had increased in numbers and acquired a better banner. They were blocking all vehicles and people. The line of cars were backed up even further!

Finally after waiting 1.5 hours a group of people were able to push through the protesters and all the tourists were able to get to the other side of the blockade. During our wait time we contemplated how to get through the protesters. Tyler and Beth followed an ambulance through the blockade at one point, but Tyler ended up having to fight off 50 Argentines with one arm while Beth was able to run to the other side.