I've chaned my mind totally on the tourist-worthiness of Iguazu falls, thanks entirely to my experience on the Argentine side. To sum it up, if you're planning a trip there, go to the Argentina side and spend at least one full day, and don't bother with Brasil unless you have time to burn (editors note: ironically ,these pics are from Hansol from the Brazil side. I'll follow with some Argentina pics when they arrive from my travel buddies).
Follow Darius' instructions, available here, on how to get into
the park for free. It works. Then, spend your 30 pesos on the 'Full day' pass, which includes a rowboat and speedboat ride.
On the rowboat, I got to see hawks, vultures, crocodiles, and crazy looking jungle birds up close. The speedboat takes your sorry, soaked butt underneath the falls for the ultimate 'baptism' as a South American tourist. Still, don't miss it if you're there.
I spent my day at the Argentine falls with Detleph and Pia, a lively German father / daughter combo. Luckily, Detleph spoke some English, so he was able to translate my crude humor to Pia, who only spoke German and Portugese. Also travelling along was my buddy Taro, a Tokyo dude who is currently studying at William and Mary college. He had a cool pair of shades that left a noticeable suntan mark on his grill at the end of the day. Oops!
We showed up around 10am, and didn't take off until 6:30 from the park, and we just had enough time to see everything that looked interesting. The last stop was a quick boat ride to a place called San Martin island, in between two massive sets of falls. On this island, there are some awesome looking trails that we didn't have time to take, but we did go into the waterfall water to take a swim. I'd like to pretend that's why my shirt isn't on in this picture (notice the rainbow? Braaaaaasil!).
During our swim, 
I m couple named Carlos and Claire from Columbia. We talked for a while about theet an awesome travellingir trip and mine, and decided to meet up in Bogota when I get up there. Just that easily, it was settled that I will be headed to Columbia along this trip, and I'm thrilled.
After we dried off, and fought away all sorts of very frightening tropical bugs, we hiked up to the Sheraton hotel for a last panaromic look at the falls and some free air conditioning, and caught the city bus back to town and our hostels and hotels.
he's going to columbia. just when i thought that you had kicked that nasty coke habit from '89. oh well.
Posted by: dragonballyee | January 10, 2005 at 09:29 AM