Paraguay / Brazil
(20/08 - 25/08)
Landlocked between Brazil, Bolivia and Argentina, Paraguay was far, far from being on the list. Completely outside the classic circuits, it has yet been our ultimate country in Latin America. And despite a relative absence of tourist sites, our visit was full of surprises… From the Bolivian border to the Brazilian border, throwback to our express crossing of almost 2000 kilometers!
Contents
Paraguay
Our journey begins at the land border with Bolivia. After presenting the required papers to the authorities (passports, PCR tests, immigration forms, vaccination records), we... wait. Because of course, no public transport serves this border post during Covid. We reassure you right away, we knew it, and we were prepared for it! We knew that hitchhiking would be the only way to reach our first destination. Now used to meeting "lost" travelers, the trucks understood that they could benefit from it. They therefore do not hesitate to offer us their services, which we kindly decline because of their exaggerated price. Luckily, a guy working in sales is kind enough to take us aboard his pick-up and agree to drop us off at the next junction.
An hour later, and here we are in La Patria, arguably the smallest village we have ever seen. Our driver then offers us a great plan: resting while he makes his sales appointment, before coming back to pick us up to drive us for 120 kilometers more! Claro that we accept! An hour passes, then a second and a third… until we get it right. He will not come! Fortunately, we learn that the La Patria - Asunción route has just resumed service and operates every Friday... which is today! We therefore book two tickets at the last minute and wait until the scheduled departure at 6 o'clock in the evening.
The bus reaches the capital at 4 a.m., and despite the fatigue accumulated over the past few days, we arrive safely at our accommodation: a dormitory with four beds (all free, thank God) in a hotel that seems to be a shared flat of males addicted to illicit substances. Regardless, we manage to get a few hours of sleep before setting off to explore the city. And that’s the shock: the inhabitants are almost all white, very tall, and speak a strange language, a mixture of Spanish, the local dialect and German. Difficult for us to understand them, and even more to endure the stifling heat. With 38°C in the middle of winter, one wonders how they can live under 50 degrees in summer! The center does not give us a nice impression, so we decide to go a little further (and by further, we mean more than an hour of public transport) to the district of Aregua. Known for its strawberry fair, we can't wait to binge on it until we can't anymore. But instead of the hundreds of stalls we expected, we land in the middle of five pop-up stalls! Despite the disappointment, we do not fail to taste several specialties.
Back to Asunción, we are preparing our future excursion which will be one of the most eventful and hectic of our entire trip around the world! Heading for… Brazil!
Brazil
Don't worry, it's not the 5th largest country on the planet that we're about to explore, but only one of its sites for a day. You guessed it, it is the famous Iguazú Falls that we are going to visit. For this, we motivate ourselves for a 7 hours bus to the border town of Ciudad del Este. Located less than 10 kilometers from Brazil, we spend the night there before THE day. We then get up at 6 am, more excited than ever. And it is accompanied by Fernando, our taxi driver for the morning that we take the road to the town of Foz and its unmissable national park. At the official border, no control is necessary for people around the border areas. A real godsend for us, fearing seeing ourselves stamped with the Brazilian blacklisted stamp in our passport! With the time difference (one hour), we arrived at our destination at 9 a.m. sharp. Exalted, we are delighted to note that we are among the first visitors. Except… that it's Monday, and the workers we meet tell us that the site is now CLOSED for maintenance. "Come back tomorrow!" Well, it's not like we have a flight to Europe, eh! Our disappointment is up to the waterfalls we were supposed to admire: HUGE. Fernando tries to negotiate with the workers and console us by offering us other amusement parks, but nothing helps. We prefer to ask him to take us directly back to Paraguay. Sad for us, he complies and we hit the road. On the way back, we see a company offering helicopter tours, which reminds us of wonderful memories... "And the helicopters, are they allowed to fly today?" it suddenly takes me to ask. "I don't know, do you want us to go check it out?" our driver then answers. Neither one nor two, I accept, without giving Anouck the time to think about it. Policy 0 regrets! Fernando returns 2 minutes later with “some good news and some bad news: the good news is that they can fly today; the bad: it's very expensive !!! ”. “How expensive?” “400 Reals”. Reals? Impossible to know what it corresponds to. We hasten to use our currency converter to find out that it's... 65€ per person! Time to exchange a quick glance... Let's go!
Our newfound euphoria, however, does not last long since at the counter, we are told that the helicopter can only go out with a minimum of three passengers on board. "Wait a bit, other customers might show up." Yeah. On the day the falls are closed, in times of Covid, not sure there are crowds! Anouck and I then simultaneously address our driver: “How about a free helicopter ride?”. Answer: “NO, never in my life, I don't get in there!” Good. We go to the cleaning lady... who refuses for the same reason. We try again with the driver, to whom we expose our best arguments (it's hard to believe that you have to convince someone for that) and who after some thought FINALLY agrees to join us. 15 minutes later, and we're all ready to take off.
Let's go for a flight over the 275 Iguazú waterfalls! A true wonder of nature, this set of UNESCO World Heritage waterfalls straddles Brazil and Argentina. If in the air we are not able to appreciate the roar and vibrations produced by the 6 million liters spilled every second, the height of the device still allows us to capture the full power of the elements in addition to being able to contemplate the total extent of the site (approximately three kilometers). In short, an incredible and ideal spectacle to say our farewell (or goodbye?) to Latin America.
Because yes, it is here that our seven months on the American continent end. Fernando, excited by the experience, keeps thanking us all the way to the bus station, where he insists on giving us two t-shirts of his new clothing brand. We then return to Asunción, where we shed several kilos of our backpacks so that they can be accepted as hand luggage for our flight the next day. Direction São Paulo, then Frankfurt, to finally land in ISTANBUL!
Highlights
OUR FAVOURITES
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The possibility to legally go to Brazil from Paraguay without official land border control
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The chance to do an helicopter flight at a competitive price
OUR DISAPPOINTMENTS
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The climate at the limit of what we can endure
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The languages very hard to understand
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The bad value for money (in Paraguay)
Budget
