Study Abroad in Santiago, Chile and Travels in South America 2013: Iguazú

Hola todos,

Besides the airport gods trying to stop me from going to Iguazú, I finally made it on the 12th. It is so so so beautiful. Definitely one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. We made it there in the afternoon of the 12th and were greeted with a burst of heat outside the airplane door. It was so warm! Compared to Buenos Aires which had been pretty rainy and cold, going to Iguazú and feel the 80 degree weather and hot sun was marvelous.
We headed to the hostel in Puerto Iguazú which is where everyone stays. (Iguazú is just the park.) When we first got there, we put our stuff down, changed into shorts and a short sleeve shirt, and headed to the supermarket to get some food. For the rest of the day, we lounged around in the sun, slept, and met some people from other parts of the world. It was a lovely cabin, and the beds, oh gosh, the beds were so wonderful and comfortable. The next day, we were going to go to the falls.
The next morning, we got going at around 10AM to take a half an hour bus ride to the falls. Upon arriving, we had to pay $35 to get into the park, but whatever. When we got in we looked at the map and decided to take the upper trail, in which we would see the tops of the falls. (As opposed to the bottom). It wasn't as big of a hike as we thought, the map was misleading, but that had no importance. We walked to the first mirador (view point), and saw an absolutely spectacular sight. There was a gigantic waterfall just pouring down, creating mist, and a rainbow. When we continued though, the view was even better. At this mirador, we could see not just that one, but the many many other waterfalls, making mist and rainbows into the river below.
We continued on to see "little" waterfalls, which were just more narrow than the others. There was so many waterfalls! After we walked the upper trail, we moved on the bottom in which you're even closer to the waterfalls. From there, you can see all of the other falls as well, but at some miradors, you're in the mist and the strong, cold water is hitting you. We then continued onto another trail in which we could see them from farther away. On top of that, we saw Brazil! Of course we didn't actually enter because we would've had to have gotten visas, but I can at least now say that I have seen Brazil.
There are normally two other trails to walk, but because there had been a lot of rain previous days, they were closed. That was too bad, but we still got to see a lot. After that, we just followed the rest of the trail and saw some more little waterfalls, that I completely just wanted to jump into, because they looked so beautiful and fun. Afterwards, we went to the cafe area to dry out in the sun. All around the area are these little raccoon-like animals called coatíes. Oh gosh, such cutie pies. Such, such cutie pies. Again, I will upload pictures.
We then returned to Puerto Iguazú and went out for an amazing dinner. We shared a parrilla, which is a variety of grilled meats: chicken, several cuts of beef, sausage, pork, you name it. And some grilled vegetables. So wonderful.
The next two days were pretty much the same, we laid by the hostel's pool and sun-bathed. Well, I sun-bathed because I tan beautifully (thank you Italian genes), but Jason is Scottish so he spent most of the time either putting on sunblock or sitting in the shade to avoid burning. Regardless, the sun was so warm, I felt it pulling out my cold, and by the end of the trip, my cold was sufficiently absorbed by the sun. (The anti-biotics helped too, I'm assuming.)
The last day, we had an early flight, so we just woke up and left. Naturally, it was an absolutely beautiful and sunny day which we would be missing completely. It was so sad to leave because Iguazú was so beautiful and sunny and warm. But, shockingly, we returned to a warm sunny Buenos Aires; not the worst change in scenery.
All in all, I can say that Iguazú is definitely a hi-light of my trip to South America and am so happy that I was able to see it. Though the pictures I've seen beforehand were beautiful, actually seeing it makes me understand why it is one of the seven natural wonders of the world. Plus, those coatíes were absolutely adorable.