Nous avons passé la frontière entre la Bolivie et l'Argentine le 5 novembre en direction du premier grand centre, Salta. Le premier mot que le garde nous a dit à la frontière était: "Avez-vous de l'argent?" En voyant nos visages embètés, il s'est empressé de nous expliqué qu'il collectionnait la monnaie canadienne. Ouf! Les Argentins furent accueillants mais très suspicieux de tous voyageurs en provenance de la Bolivie. Sur une distance de moins de 20km nous avons passé deux controles où nos bagages ont été fouillés. "Rien à déclarer!"
Nous avons passé une nuit à Salta question de planifier notre prochain destination, les chutes d'Iguazu. Nous avons vite compris que les distances en Argentine sont semblables au Canada. Pour aller d'un endroit à l'autre, il faut beaucoup de temps. L'avantage c'est que nous voyageons de nuit et les Argentins possèdent ces merveilleux bus Cama Suite dans lesquels ont sert repas chauds, champagne et whisky.
La ville la plus près des chutes se nomme Puerto Iguazu, nous y avons passé 2 nuits. Les chutes se trouvent à environ 30 minutes de bus de la ville jusqu'à l'entrée du parc.
Comme en témoignent les photos, nos chutes Niagara sont minuscules à côté de celles-ci.
Nous avons passé la journée dans les sentiers du parc qui vont en haut des chutes, au bas et dans la jungle qui entoure le tout. Avec toute l'humidité ressentit, nous avons décidé de finir la journée avec la ballade en bateau sous les chutes.(J'ai baptisé cette ballade, "LA DOUCHE")
Il est dit que lors d'une visite des chutes d'Iguazu les gens deviennent euphoriques ou du moins, de bonne humeur. Mike et moi avons fait l'expérience en essayant de s'astiner et laisser la bonne humeur nous envahir. Conclusion: cette endroit est tellement hors du commun et époustouflant que personne ne peut éviter d'en repartir avec le sourire et un soupçon d'euphorie.
After another really long, hot bus ride from Santa Cruz across what I thought was the flatest country on the planet we spent a night in the town of Yacuiba (very nice fountain in the square. Not so helpful people at the hardware store) and the next day passed on foot through the border with Argentina. We were one day short of being two months in Bolivia, entering Argentina on November 5. We cruised up to the Argentinian window with the usual border crossing jitters only to have the officer lean out the window, look to his left then right and say quietly ¨do you have any Canadian money?¨ I immediately thought of what an Argentine jail looked like. He must have seen the looks on our faces because he quickly smiled and told us he was collecting coins and didn´t have any Canadian ones. We had two twonies on us and traded them for 10 pesos - we made 50 cents, sucka! Then without further adventure we passed through into Argentina. The first thing we noticed was the amount of people smoking - Argentines love to smoke. Other than that it felt like Bolivia, except that everything was way more expensive, including the bus tickets. We figure we paid almost 10 times the price for the same bus as we would have in Bolivia. Our first stop was a city called Salta. We were rushing to get to Buenos Aires in time for previous arrangements so only stayed one night before we took an all night bus the next day for Iguazu Falls. Now this bus was the cats meow. It is what they call a cama suite which includes a cot, movies, hot meals, wine with supper and your choice of champagne or whiskey before bed! It was also our first introduction into how big Argentina is. We were on this bus, which traveled on very good roads, for 24 hours!
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| Welcome to Argentina!/Je suis en Argentine. |
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| The central square in Salta. We´ve disovered that one of our favourite things to do is check out a city´s public spaces. This one had a big pond with pedal boats and giant orange fish in it./Parc central de Salta, notre premier stop en terre Argentaine. |
Iguazu Falls. I had never heard of Iguazu Falls before we had met Aaron and Laura in Bolivia. I had no idea what to expect as we made it to town. We quickly found a hostel with a double bed (due to costs in Argentina we had to now look for dorm rooms most of the time) - unfortunately the hostel was being rennovated and we now know to avoid a place if that is going on. However, we had a nice supper (with great wine!) where we witnessed another difference with Bolivia - an aeorobics class was happening across the street - and headed out to the falls the next day. We took a 30 minute bus from town to reach the complex. Iguazu Falls is more than just the falls, it is an entire national park which protects all sorts of wildlife, some of which we saw including a toucan. The Iguazu River forms the border with Brazil here, and a little further on with Paraguay. The falls are incredible, gorgeous and huge. They make Niagara look almost silly in comparison because of the beauty of the falls and the lack of horrible tacky. An Argentine we met later, when describing his recent visit to Canada, said that he thought the whole country was fantastic ¨except for Niagara, that was awful¨ - I have to agree, but we´re going to try and visit when we come back home next summer just to make sure. We saw the famous ¨Garganta del Diablo¨ (Devil´s throat), then walked along the upper and lower trails where you can look at the line of falls from various angles, and then finished with a boat ride right into some of the falls. We were thoroughly soaked by the end of the day. There´s a theory that the mixing of ions caused by the masses of crashing water can seriously improve your mood. Elise and I had so much fun that I´d have to agree. What a great day.
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| The Devil´s Throat, mainly to the right, with Brazil in the distance./La gorge du Diable avec le Brésil en arrière plan. |
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| Mike waving from under one of the many falls./Mike vous salue avant de plonger vers une mort certaine aux bas des chutes. Par chance, il sera sauver par la sangle de l'appareil photo d'un touriste japonais. |
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| Usually you can visit the island to the left but water levels were too high. We went right in there on a zodiac... Une idée d'où notre ballade en zodiaque nous a conduit. UNE DOUCHE!!! |
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| ...like this one. |
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| Who stole my fruitloops?/ Sam le Toucan |
Next stop was Buenos Aires. Again a night bus, again champagne and whiskey!
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