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It appears STA have undone all my hard work of copying and pasting the links to my photos. Therefore if you want to see photos please send me an email on this site (they´ll prob just delete my email ad if I write it on here) and I will happily send them on to you.
It seems ages since I wrote a blog and the only spare minute I had to write it was sitting in a tent on the Inca Trail waiting for dinner! (There´s another blog I have to catch up with).From Florianopolis we took the overnight bus to Iguazu Falls, which passed pretty much without incident. We arrived early morning and tagged along with the Ozzies and South Africans from the hostel in Florianopolis who seemded as equally lost as us. We decided not to do the Brazilian side of the falls both to save money and because most people we spoke to said it wasn´t really worth it. We eventually worked out that we needed to get a bus to the local bus station from the big bus station and look out for a really tiny sign that said Argentina on it (we were still in Brazil at that point). We then had to get another bus from there (tiny bus + masses of luggage and surf boards = very cosy journey!) to the border control. We then had to get off the bus, get our exit stamps, then get another bus to the Argentinian border, get entry stamps and get another bus to Puerto Iguazu. Finally we had to get a taxi to the hostel which was 5km out of town but it was definitely worth the journey. The hostel was an old casino and so had massive communal areas as well as an outdoor pool. We dumped our bags and managed to grab a bowl of cornflakes before breakfast was whipped away (when they say brekkie finishes at 10am they mean it). It was a really nice day but too late to do the full day excursion to the falls so we both had showers then walked back into the town for a wander around. We went to this really cheap restaurant for lunch with all you can eat salad, empanadas (pasties) and these fried vegetable things that taste better than potatoes. We also stupidly ordered meat and fish, I had steak and they may as well have wheeled in a full cow. Kate´s fish arrived on a massive platter with head and all.The next day we knew the weather was going to be rubbish so we had arranged the trip to the falls for the the following day. We decided to get all our washing done and update our blogs as well as look for some new trousers for Kate since someone had stolen them out of shower. Unfortunately we´d had to put all of our warm clothes in the wash, so we spent a miserable and soggy 4 hours wandering around a very small town finding no shops with warm clothes and generally not much in the town. We decided the day was a complete write off, think it was the first time I felt a bit home sick. We were worried about the weather for the following day since it had been so horrible the day before but it was really beautiful and sunny. This was the first day we felt like tourists as we were booked on a tour with lots of Americans who all had the most over the top technical walking gear and camera equipment. The day was amazing though, we started with a jeep tour through the jungle (bit rubbish as we couldn´t the guide and think we would have preferred to walk it). The jeep then dropped us off at the river where we got into the speed boat that was taking us up the river to the falls. The rapids were incredible! It would have been an amazing place to do white water rafting had we known it was possible. The speed boat took us right up into the first lot of falls and the power of the water was unbelievable. As we approached the falls we were all speechless, it was absolutely breathtaking. I was a bit disappointed though as I honestly thought the boat would go up to the devils throat and when I said this to Kate she looked at me horrified as if I was mad.After the boat trip we spent a couple of hours walking around the falls and as well as the hundreds of people, we saw some weird racoon type animals. One of them took a particular liking to Kates plastic bag of food and wouldn´t leave her alone. They´re pretty nasty and tend to bite but it was pretty funny so I took a pic and then helped her. The last part of the day was taking the little train to the Devils Throat, which was amazing. It was so loud and powerful and as usual at the critical moment my camera decided to play up and refused to take any more pics (damn you and your champagne Lucinda!).We spent a good siz hours walking around and were pretty hungry (surprise surprise) and since we´d enjoyed the restaurant the day before so much we were going to go back there. All the way there on the bus we were really looking forward to it and we were so disappointed when we got there and it was shut. We wandered around for a bit trying to explain to each restaurant what we´d had til we finally got to one that promised the same. Unfortunately it wasn´t the same and the waiter proceeded to bring out lots of mini traditional Argentinian dishes. One of these dishes was a whole cows tongue slapped on a plate with a bit of garnish that Kate couldn´t even look at and I asked if it could be taken away.. The waiter was really happy to practise his English and proceeded to tell us his life story. He was nice enough but we just wanted to eat and get out of there as we didn´t have a lot of time before our coach left for Buenos Aires. He told us he wanted to buy a boat and sail across the ocean (he wasn´t specific about which one) and he went on and on and on. When the waiter brought out the fruit salad which appeared to be all apple and asked us if we could guess which fruits were in it I couldn't hold back from laughin when Kate looked at me and said seriously, "erm…apple?!"That night we got the coach to Buenos Aires and it was the best coach I have ever been on. Our seats were massive and reclined really far, we had films to watch, a waitress serving us food, wine and whiskey before bed! I slept like a log and woke up as we arrived into Buenos Aires. Whilst we were in the bus station we thought we´d be super organised and arrange our ticket to Peru 10 days later but more on our epic 3 day bus journey in another blog!
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