Tag Archives: Paraguay

IGUAZU FALLS (Cataratas del Iguazú), Argentina

httpv://youtu.be/mui7BLvrHxg

By Judy J. Pinegar

The name “Iguazu” comes from the Guarani (native Indian) words “y“, meaning “water”, and “ûasú “[wa?su], meaning “big”. Legend has it that a god planned to marry a beautiful woman named Naipí, who fled with her mortal lover Tarobá in a canoe. In rage, the god sliced the river, creating the waterfalls and condemning the lovers to an eternal fall. The first European to see the falls was a Spanish Conquistador in 1541.

Puerto Iguazu, we had been here before, maybe 12 years ago, and it is now much more of a tourist trap. The hotel we had for about 150 pesos a night is now almost 600 pesos and the restaurant across the street cost us 300 pesos (poor us; this is 60 dollars or less as the rate is now over 6 pesos to the dollar, but still we resent the increased cost!)

We walked to Los Tres Fronteras (the three frontiers), where you can stand on Argentine soil and see both Brazil and Paraguay across two different Rivers, the Iguazu and the Parana, both greatly built up from the last time we were here. The next day we took a local bus (also now much inflated in price) to the Argentine falls. After a train ride, we spent about 5 hours walking both the lower and upper trails to see the falls. John’s video does great justice to the amazing sights on those trails.

Iguazu River tumbles over the edge of the Paraná Plateau, formed by volcanic activity. Numerous islands along 1.7 mile edge divide the falls into numerous separate waterfalls and cataracts, varying between 197 to 269 ft high. The number of these smaller waterfalls fluctuates from 150 to 300, depending on the water level. Names have been given also to many other smaller falls, such as San Martin Falls, Bossetti Falls and many others.  About half of the river’s flow falls into a long and narrow chasm called the Devil’s Throat (Garganta del Diablo in Spanish or Garganta do Diaboin Portuguese). (We will talk about and show this in our next blog.)


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Scenes of Posadas, Capital City of Misiones, Argentina

httpv://youtu.be/pFav9fPO0lI

By Judy J. Pinegar

We decided to leave Carlos Pelegrini a day early, as it is so had to get around here, not a lot to do that we haven’t done, and very hot. We have three times eaten at the same restaurant, on two occasions it was the only open place in town, and it took a lot of walking to find that out. So we are giving the family a plug, when in Carlos Pelegrini eat at the Yacaru Pora Restaurante. See John’s picture of me with the mother and son, of obvious German or Dutch extraction which seems common in this part of Argentina, a few blond heads.

We are leaving in a remise (car for hire) run by Hugo Boccalandro, who seems to be the wheeler and dealer in town for transportation due to the terrible bus situation, and we are going direct to Posadas, which is on the way to Iguazu Falls, our next long stop. The trip was a LONG one a very bad dirt road for about 2 of the three hours.

We saw some farms and many, many huge dirt mounds right out in the middle of a field or near a fence, and a lot near the town of Posada were there were electrical wires. I found out they are Argentine fire ants which I have discovered  have mounds up to 12 inches tall and wider at the base. However when you look at them, you see absolutely no activity.  Apparently they access the outside through tunnels going out in the dirt all around the mound, opening up about 30 yards away from the nest. We didn’t go check that out because in Carlos Pelegrini, John was bit by some of these very tiny ants on the hand, and three days later they still hurt! Wikipedia says they are also attracted to electricity.

We traveled along the edge of the Esteros del Iberia marshes for a long way, then across dry land to the town of Posadas which is on the river Parana. On the other side of the river is the country of Paraguay. We arrived there about 6 PM, and stayed in a hotel across from the main square, with the obligatory church and a nice park where we saw children running through a sort of unique ground level water fountain of various timing and heights. it was hot and I wished I could go in too.

Posadas is a larger town with about 300 thousand inhabitants, but not much in the way of sights as we discovered after walking all over town the next day trying to find open museums. Posadas is sort of a stopping point to see area where there are ruins of an old Jesuit mission  system (30 missions in Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina in the 1600’s and 1700’s. We decided to go to the small town of San Ignacio for a closer look… in our next blog


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For all your real estate neeeds
Call or email:

John J. O’Dell Realtor® GRI
Civil Engineer
General Contractor
(530) 263-1091
Email jodell@nevadacounty.com

DRE# 00669941

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