We had
a great night at the hotel in the park. It was dark and
quiet and we did keep our patio doors locked to prevent the
monkeys from getting inside. Next morning, we had to check
out of the hotel, but decided to do a boat trip on the Rio
Parana up to the base of the small portion of Iguazu Falls.
The photos below are what we saw.
We
booked the tour through the hotel and it was easy. We
walked to the assembly point and they put us on flat bed trucks
that had plastic seats. The truck had a 30 person capacity
and a guide with a PA system which I found quite annoying.
Noise notwithstanding, the path to the put-in point on the river
was through the dense jungle on a dirt track.
We
descended down a significant hill via concrete stairs to get to
the river. At the bottom, the vendor had huge piles of
life vests (AKA PFD for "personal floatation device"). The
vests were quite mildewed and had a rather strong odor.
This revelation accounted for what my nose, on the prior day,
reported as a big problem among hikers on the Iguazu trails that
passed us. It seems that they, too, had gone on the boat
tour and the scent had rubbed off resulting in their odor plume
inflicted on nearby hikers.
The
boats were big and had powerful outboard motors to conquer the
strong river currents. Note the river bank in the
left-center of the photo above. The river is typically
much higher as evidenced by the marks in the sand. Indeed,
the boat tour was shorter than normal because of the exposed
rocks in the river. Given the current power of the river,
it boggles my mind to consider what the falls are like in the
wet season. Perhaps on another trip.
The
pilot has a high visibility position on a flying bridge at the
rear of the craft.
Once
underway, we traveled upriver past the steep river banks.
On the
Brazilian side, they had a funicular to get them from the top of
the gorge to the put-in point.
My view
looking forward. This shaggy fellow had some odd shit in
his dreads. While the camera did not focus on what I
wanted because he was so close, you can see the light colored
area just to the right of center in the photo above. This
is a beer pull-tab that has become embedded in his dreads.
WTF?
As we
got further upstream, the steep banks became cliffs.
The
river tours are very popular and there were plenty of boats on
the river. This fellow was coming at us at Mach 2.
As we
got closer, we started to see small side falls that were visible
from the lower trail that we took the day prior.
There is
a photo of this falls in the previous day's web page. Note
the bridge over the falls. Earlier photos were shot from
that bridge.
We came
into the open amphitheater created by the river flow and were
treated to a spectacular view.
We had a
low-budget boat as ours was open. This boat had a shield
to prevent the passengers from getting douched.
The
Garganta del Diablo (Devil's Throat) is straight ahead.
Due to the low water and exposed rocks, we would not get any
closer to that portion of the falls complex. Note the huge
curtain of spray at the bottom of the Throat.
Some of
the smaller side falls were very impressive in their own right.
This is
as close as we got to the Devil's Throat. The noise was
tremendous.
The flow
of the river, despite being "low" produced strong currents and
powerful hydraulic action.
More
side falls were visible.
A
parting view of the Devil's Throat.
The boat
turned west into the other channel of the river. We are
headed to the throat on the left of the photo above. We
were instructed to retire the cameras to the dry-bags, and most
folks complied as did I. Those that did not were rewarded
with damaged electronics. The spray was already dousing us
and we were not that close to the actual throat. The boat
went right up to the base of the throat and we were soaked.
We would have been dryer if we had been hit with a fire
hose. Happily, we knew this was coming and dressed
accordingly. We left our wallets and phones in the dry bag
and put the cameras in at the last command. The river
water was tepid, but it was cold at speed once we were doused.
Another
large side falls produced a curtain of water. We got
doused 5 or 6 times. For me, no dousing would have been
OK, but when in Rome. After the final dousing, we headed
back to the dock, disembarked and hiked up the hill to the truck
which returned through the dense jungle to the starting point.
When we
got back to the hotel, we were soaked. We headed to the
spa area and got showers and rinsed our clothes. When we
got back to the room, we could see the visitor's center on the
Brazilian side of the falls.
A
parting shot of Iguazu Falls from the balcony of our room.
A really awesome place.
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Photos and Text Copyright Bill Caid 2018, all rights
reserved.
For your enjoyment only, not for commercial use.