Iguazú part one- the Argentinian side

Apologies for the massive delay guys, it’s been a hectic month but once again thanks to the nagging of my most loyal fan/ possibly only follower left by this point (my mother) we are back on track 🙂

So Ceca’s and mine first real solo adventure was to one of the most incredible natural phenomenon in South America, Iguazu falls. The Iguazu waterfalls come from the Iguazu river and is situated on the border between the Argentinian state of Misiones in the north, and the southern Brazilian state of Paraná where we were staying. To see the waterfalls fully you have to cross to the Argentinian side where you can see them close up, and then get a beautiful panorama of the whole waterfalls from the Brazilian side. We decided to start off with the Argentinian side 🙂

It was Ceca’s first time in Argentina and it took us all of 5 minutes on Argentinian soil before random Argentinian men started coming up to us in order to welcome us and express that wonderful Argentinian hospitality we all know and love. We took photos together with the Argentinian and Serbian flags (actually the official flag of Misiones but it’s identical to the Serbian one so we just pretended), exchanged hospitalities and made our way to the falls.

The name Iguazu comes from the Guaraní (language spoken in Paraguay and in some of these regions in Brazil and Argentina) word “y” meaning water, and “ûasú” meaning big. The old Guaraní legend is that the waterfall was created by a jealous forest God. He was angered by a warrior who escaped down the river in a canoe with a young girl who the God fancied and as a result he made the riverbed collapse. The girl fell down the falls and became a rock while the warrior became a tree overlooking the waterfalls. Further proof, in case we needed it, that male egos have been causing chaos since the beginning of time 🙂

The waterfalls themselves are made up of 275 separate falls and are about 80m tall. Iguazu currently has the second greatest average annual flow of any waterfall in the world, after Niagara. I’ve been to Niagara, and as impressive as it is, personally I think Iguazu is prettier and allows you to get closer to the action 🙂 At one point you can stand at a walkway and be surrounded by 260 degrees of waterfalls.

The most impressive part of the falls is the “Garganta del Diablo” (Devil’s throat), a semicircular drop with a walkway that practically enters the waterfalls. If anyone ever wanted to go in style this would be the way to do it. It’s 82m high, 150 wide and 700 long. And if you don’t want to throw yourself down a waterfall apparently you have to be careful. Although we all felt very safe, more than one tourist has been swept downriver and drowned at the falls and in 1997 a jaguar killed a park stranger’s son. At this point I should add the waterfalls are not the only attraction- they are situated in a national park of subtropical rainforest, with more than 2000 identified plant species, 400 bird species and many mammals and reptiles. We actually got closer to wild monkeys than we did in the jungle!

We had a really fun day and got together a multicultural group with friends from Japan, Holland, Poland and the States which made the inbetween waterfalls part amusing as well. It was definitely a good way to introduce Ceca to Argentina and a beautiful way for me to finally say bye as well.