Day 39 - February 11, 2008 - Iguazu Falls, Brazil and Argentina

Iguazu Falls Day 2 photos
Breakfast was served from 6-7am. It was a large buffet. Sadly, they had only about 3oz. goblets and one pitcher of water as the only water served. We had finished off all our water from yesterday and the bottle we took with us from dinner last night. We had some long waits for that pitcher between refillings and then all the trips with our tiny goblets. Strange. There was a lot of fruit and bread. You could make your own toast. There were 3 kinds of weenies in a steam tray. Bacon and scrambled eggs. It was alright, but nothing to write home about. Coffee was very strong and bitter.
By 7:30am, we had to checkout of the hotel. By 8am, we needed to be on the bus. Our RSSC information was that today was the day we would get very wet. Our local guide suggested that since we would not have a time or place to change clothes before flying out that we simply bring rain ponchos or buy them at the park in Argentina.
While waiting outside for our group to muster and the bus to arrive, we noticed some interesting woven bird nests hanging from the palm trees planted near the entrance to the hotel. We asked our local guide and she said they belonged to the red-rumped casiki (no idea how it should be spelled, that is what it sounded like she said). She said that these birds weave their nests near humans because toucans tear them up to eat the eggs and toucans don't like humans. OK, so we stationed ourselves there to watch for birds. We did see a red-rumped casiki. Debbie described it to Clay before we knew the name. Debbie thought it was a fairly big black bird with red wings when spread. It turns out that it is their tail feathers that spread open to reveal the red! Then, lo and behold a toucan arrived nearby and flew right over us, between the trees and over the hotel. It was most improbable that it would even be capable of flight, the beak was so impossibly large compared to the rest of the bird! Clay missed it. Soon, there was another across the lawn and the street. Clay saw that one along with several other people. Why didn't anyone tell us what to look for yesterday!?! We had been watching a number and variety of birds in the courtyard area and around the pool earlier after breakfast and checkout and before departure time.
It was a very short drive to the border with Argentina, then it was about 1+ hour wait at the border check. Fortunately for us, we got to sit on the air conditioned bus while our local tour guide took all our passports to be stamped and cleared at both countries' Immigration and Customs checkpoints. We were allowed to cross and then an Argentine official came on the bus with Isabelle, our local guide, and he eyeballed us each individually and appeared to do a head count. He eventually left the bus and we were on our way. It was about another half hour drive before we arrived at the start of our tour of the Argentine side of the Falls.

We had to take 2 small trains to get to the start of our first path to Devil's Throat from this side. In the bus, Isabelle had described the 4 paths of catwalks here and where we would go and what we would see. Unfortunately, we only had time on our tour for this path in its entirety, but we would not learn that until about an hour after we had started out. The trains run on time tables and our group was able to get on each train at the time that Isabelle had planned for us, but we still had some waits. The longest wait was also the only time we had rain, so that was really lucky. Also, the place were we might have gotten very wet from spray at the Devil's Throat, the wind was blowing towards Brazil and so we mostly stayed dry and only had to use ponchos or umbrellas for about 15 minutes and not when we were at the Falls at all.
We walked for quite a long ways before we could see the Falls. We could hear the sound building and see the spray, but it was a good long walk on slippery metal before we arrived. It was just breathtaking. Waiting to board the first train, a frog-like croaking was heard and then we saw a toucan. He was pretty close, but flew away too quickly. Then we spotted a pair in the distance on the other side of the train. We hurried to the front of the train to get photos and then boarded the first car to wait for time to go. Very exciting. Clay got to see them and take some photos. On the walk to the Devil's Throat we saw plush-crested jays, other birds and a very large caiman. (There is some dispute among the viewers as to the size. It varies from 4 feet to 12 feet. Of course, a caiman should not be that large. But, we were told that caiman are the only large gator-types here. So, if it wasn't a caiman then it should not have been there. Though, they did tell us that they thought they did not have anaconda and they recently found one that weighed 300 pounds! They thought they could not live here because it is a sub-tropical forest which means that the temperature occasionally reaches freezing.) We saw turtles and fish in the water as well. There were some scary/silly signs along the catwalks about snakes and humans, but we did not see any snakes. Thankfully.
Once we were in sight of the Devils' Throat, Isabelle told us to start walking back within 15-20 minutes and meet at the snack bar to catch the train back. We all got squeezed onto the first train available back and got off at the Cataratas Station in the middle of the train's route. From here there are 3 additional viewing trails. We did not have time to complete even one now. We arrived at Cataratas Station at 12:30pm and were told that we had to be at a restaurant for lunch at 1pm. We were told originally and on the bus this morning that we would have lunch in Brazil at Porto Canoas, but now we were told that it would be at La Selva here in the Argentine park. So, we had about 20 minutes to be back to board the next train to the Central Station.
We were allowed to walk part of the Salto Dos Hermanos/Bossetti. This is a portion of the Upper Circuit. We had to skip the rest as well as the Lower Circuit and the San Martin Island. This was disappointing and we questioned it. We were told that we had diabetics and they required lunch at 1pm and it was not negotiable. Lunch was another grilled meat buffet and again it was very good and abundant. We had all the beer and wine we could hold and it kept coming. It was a very long lunch. They told us we could sleep on the bus and on the plane to Salvador de Bahia. OK.
Finally, we were told to use the toilets and get on the bus. We drove again to the border for a very long wait in a long line of buses while Isabelle walked on ahead and through the checkpoints. We were not boarded this time. We arrived at the airport on time. Isabelle had us wait in the general terminal while she went to get our boarding passes. We all just took our own luggage either through security or to the checkin desk to check luggage. So, the group got all spread out and separated, but there was only one departure gate area and we were all in there in plenty of time. Isabelle told us to make sure we boarded when called because we were on the last flight out that day!
We were at the airport at 3:45pm and our flight departed at 5:10pm. We expected to arrive at Salvador at 8:25pm per our RSSC literature delivered to our cabins 2 days before we left. It turns out that was not possible because one, it was not a non-stop flight and two there is a one-hour timedifference between Iguazu and Salvador de Bahia. So, we departed on time in a plane about 2/3rds full and we flew back to Rio de Janeiro. We sat on the plane in Rio for close to 2 hours before we took off again for Salvador. We were on the plane this time for about 6 hours. Meanwhile, we had to advance our watches one hour to arrive at Salvador at about 10:30pm. The local guide on the 45 minute bus ride told us that we would have to have dinner first before checking in so our luggage could be delivered. He had already been told by a few people that they were just too tired to eat dinner and they wanted to go straight to bed.
So, when we parked in front of our fairly awful hotel later, about half of us just just went under the bus and got our own luggage with an argument and then got our own rooms keys while being told that we had to have dinner first. But, the hotel desk had our keys ready and just handed them out as we gave our names. We didn't even bother showering and just fell into bed. The hotel was about 22 stories above ground and a few below. The guidebooks say the only redeeming feature here is the pool and the cable car down the cliff to the sea. The guide on the bus said it was an ordinary hotel, nothing nice, but wait until you open your curtains tomorrow morning and see the view of the bay. Wow. We guess that he has never cruised and has no idea that we get a view like that or even better every single day!
So, when we opened our curtains in the morning no one was really wowed. Plus, here is the weird thing. It was still full dark at 7am in Iguazu, but it was broad daylight here in Salvador at 5:30am. Breakfast was to be at anytime in the morning between either 6 and 10am or 7 and 10am. It is still not clear. So, our arrival. We got another triple room here on the 19th floor. All the hallways were open air. All the public spaces had lights on motion sensors, if it went dark before you got the door unlocked, just keep moving. They had the system where you had to insert the key in a slot to turn on the electricity in the room. So, at 11pm or so it was over 100 degrees in our room when we arrived. We know because Debbie has a souvenir thermometer hanging on her backpack. It was about 3am before the room temperature became tolerable. There were 2 single beds and a plywood cot in a small room with a kitchenette. The window fully opened without a screen. It was a long way down to the pool below and there were about 6 lounge chairs down there. You had to lean against the glass or out the window in order to see straight down to the pool. Scary! It was a very small pool and very few chairs for a 22-story hotel! The bathroom was a tub with shower and a toilet and single sink. The AC did not vent anywhere in the room except the beds area which also had 2 chairs a table, a love seat, a desk with TV and closet. There was only a thin pillow, thin sheet and a bedspread on each bed. There were no extra blankets or pillows in the closet. The AC unit when switched on had a light bulb inside the system and you either had to sleep with the light on in the sleeping area, or switch the AC off to get the light off. We just sleep with the light on and the AC blowing directly on the first bed. We tried to adjust the vent slats but they were really dirty and covered with spider webs which was a little scary. But, we did get all the slats at least open. It appeared that someone had earlier closed them all to keep them from blowing on that first bed maybe or to block the light coming through there. Who knows?
There is a small Sofitel by a nice beach very near the airport. If we had to leave Iguazu early yesterday to spend a night in Salvador, wouldn't that have been a better choice? Better still, was there not a flight directly (or indirectly) to Salvador de Bahia the following day? We wound up spending a total of about 6 hours viewing the Falls. The 60 people who took the 12.5 hour tour from Buenos Aires were on direct non-stop charter flights and had 8 hours at the Falls. They only missed our one hour walk at Das Cataratas Hotel to the Brazilian side of Devil's Throat so they did not miss a lot, but we did. We missed 2 nights and a day off the ship and for less time at the Falls. This was some really poor planning and we were afraid of that when we booked. But, we had been told that we really need to see both sides. We did not realize that this particular itinerary would give us so little of 2 sides and it still doesn't seem that it had to be this way. We expected Regent to do a better job and we were disappointed.
Iguazu Falls Day 2 photos