Seeking an escape to warmer climes from the chilly porteno winter, Patrick and I headed northbound on an overnight bus trip to the province of Misiones, an Argentine land island jutting up between Paraguay and Brazil. The province, named for the 16th century Jesuit missions made famous by the film "The Mission," is home to several ruins of these impressive mission sites, as well as the amazing natural wonder of Iguazu Falls, on the Brazilian border.
Awaking after an overnight bus trek, the first thing one notices is the marked difference in landscape. The foliage is subtropical and the clay is has a dark reddish hue to it, in the flat fields and dusting up the roadsides. The effect gives the area an African feel. There are no highways in this region, so travel up along the skinny finger of Misiones takes some time on country roads.
The small town of Puerto Iguazu on the Argentine side of the falls is really no more than a dozy frontier outpost, with a bit of the Wild West about it. Besides a few tourist agencies and knick-knack shops in the centre of the town, most of the accommodation and other tourist infrastructure has moved out to the route towards the falls themselves.
The falls are about 20 km from Puerto Iguazu, in a still relatively natural setting despite the quantity of tourists that make it out there. For this it is a major improvement on Niagara Falls since, instead of being surrounded by glitzy concrete jungle it is surrounded by a real natural one, complete with toucans, monkeys, coaties and other regional wildlife. The natural park on the Argentine side includes many hiking trails, boat launches to San Martin Island in the centre of the falls, and a small train over to the catwalk overlooking the amazing Garganta del Diablo (Devil's Throat) falls. Besides this, there are several areas with small eateries and souvenir stalls, Guarani indian artisan vendors, and an upscale Sheraton Hotel looking at the falls from a distance. Here we had a large buffet lunch in the middle of the day, to break up the hiking about.
When we went it was the height of the winter Argentine tourist season, so the place was quite swamped, meaning there were delays of well over an hour to use the boat launches and even a hefty delay on the train. However, we did manage to catch the last train over to the Devil's Throat, where we caught a glimpse of the most treacherous and impressive cascades just before sunset. It was quite exhilirating, with mist billowing high into the air, and flocks of birds nose-diving into the belly of the beast.
We stayed in a clean, modern hostel built into an old casino along this route. While the place seemed lovely and the decor was interesting, the staff was horrible and really spoiled the experience of staying there. On our last night there, we bumped into a crowd of Irish backpackers who spoke little to no Spanish and whose prime tourist activity was getting plastered. One of them bragged that he had recently been arrested and kicked out of a 5-star hotel for getting drunk and singing in the middle of the night, and was awaiting trial. That same night, we got in a political debate with a Floridian we had earlier met in Buenos Aires through my friend Ann-Marie, and who happened to be travelling to Iguazu at the same time as us. He was a staunch Republican and apologist for the war in Iraq, the keeping of prisoners in Guantanamo, etc. Later in the night when he wound up listening to the nationalistic rantings of the Irish crowd, we decided it was time to call it a night.
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