Tag Archives: Argentine

Travel

Iguazu Falls Upper Trail and Devil’s Throat, Argentina

httpv://youtu.be/wxYABo65Dv8

This video shows the view from the upper trail and from the walkways along the Devil’s Throat.

The Argentine access across the forest, is by a Rainforest Ecological Train, The train brings visitors to the entrance of Devil’s Throat, as well as the upper and lower trails. The Paseo Garganta del Diablo is a 1-kilometre-long (0.6 mi) trail that brings the visitor directly over the falls of the Devil’s Throat, the highest and deepest of the falls. Other walkways allow access to the elongated stretch of falls across the forest on the Argentine side and to the boats that connect to San Martin Island. Also on the Argentinian side, there are inflatable boat services that take visitors right under the falls.

Mist rises between 100 and 490 feet from Iguazu’s Devil’s Throat, Iguazu affords fantastic views and walkways and its shape allows for spectacular vistas. At one point a person can stand and be surrounded by 260 degrees of waterfalls. The Devil’s Throat in Argentina has water pouring into it from three sides. Likewise, because Iguazu is split into many relatively small falls, one can view these a portion at a time.

On November 11 of 2011, Iguazu Falls was announced as one of the seven winners of the New Seven Wonders of Nature by the New Seven Wonders of the World Foundation.

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IGUAZU FALLS (Cataratas del Iguazú), Argentina

httpv://youtu.be/mui7BLvrHxg

By Judy J. Pinegar

The name “Iguazu” comes from the Guarani (native Indian) words “y“, meaning “water”, and “ûasú “[wa?su], meaning “big”. Legend has it that a god planned to marry a beautiful woman named Naipí, who fled with her mortal lover Tarobá in a canoe. In rage, the god sliced the river, creating the waterfalls and condemning the lovers to an eternal fall. The first European to see the falls was a Spanish Conquistador in 1541.

Puerto Iguazu, we had been here before, maybe 12 years ago, and it is now much more of a tourist trap. The hotel we had for about 150 pesos a night is now almost 600 pesos and the restaurant across the street cost us 300 pesos (poor us; this is 60 dollars or less as the rate is now over 6 pesos to the dollar, but still we resent the increased cost!)

We walked to Los Tres Fronteras (the three frontiers), where you can stand on Argentine soil and see both Brazil and Paraguay across two different Rivers, the Iguazu and the Parana, both greatly built up from the last time we were here. The next day we took a local bus (also now much inflated in price) to the Argentine falls. After a train ride, we spent about 5 hours walking both the lower and upper trails to see the falls. John’s video does great justice to the amazing sights on those trails.

Iguazu River tumbles over the edge of the Paraná Plateau, formed by volcanic activity. Numerous islands along 1.7 mile edge divide the falls into numerous separate waterfalls and cataracts, varying between 197 to 269 ft high. The number of these smaller waterfalls fluctuates from 150 to 300, depending on the water level. Names have been given also to many other smaller falls, such as San Martin Falls, Bossetti Falls and many others.  About half of the river’s flow falls into a long and narrow chasm called the Devil’s Throat (Garganta del Diablo in Spanish or Garganta do Diaboin Portuguese). (We will talk about and show this in our next blog.)


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Travel

From Buenos Aires to Ciudad Mercedes Then to Carlos Pelegrini

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Ciudad Mercedes at night

By Judy Pinegar

Well we have started our north eastern Argentine adventure, and it was a little rough at the beginning. We took the Via Barouche bus lines from Buenos Aires to Mercedes, a small town in the central portion of the north eastern province (like a state) in Argentina. It left at 7PM and the travel book I had said it would take 12 hours. The seats are roomy and allow you to lay down and elevate your feet, much better than an airline seat. So we thought we would be on it for the night. A nice meal (also better than airline food) was served at about 9:30 to 10, typical Argentine dinner time. then the movie began and it was very loud, couldn’t sleep, so about 11:30 or so we got to sleep. The next thing I know is that we are in Mercedes, and it is only 4:30 in the morning.

Mercedes is a very small town and there were no outward bound busses to Carlos Pelegrini shown until about 10:30 AM, so we sat and compared notes with a couple of traveling German girls, on a break after college, but now living in Chile. As the time approached and more offices were opened it became apparent that the bus we were waiting for would not go, it was broken. Several people with cars (called remises) came by to see if we wanted to go with them, but it was cost prohibitive, and in addition we found some of them greatly inflated the price when they saw John and I with our I pads!

So later we found a bus leaving from a different location at 12 PM, but our tiredness was compounded by the fact that we could find no open restaurants (at this time it was 11 AM and lunch in Argentina begins about 1PM). So we get on the bus which turns out to be a local milk run, driving all over town picking up people carrying packages (mostly food and things) to take to Carlos Pelegrini. Then the actual ride began, three hours on a bumpy dirt road. Oh my… hard on the bladder too.

But we saw a lot of wetlands, and some vaqueros and cattle (albeit they were ON the road)… see Johns “moving bus” pictures.

In the next adventure things will get better!

 

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Travel

Overview of Buenos Aires, Argentina

httpv://youtu.be/YovnHi7Jeeg

We’re back in Buenos Aires.  We took a ferry directly from Montevideo, Uruguay to Buenos Aires. It was supposed to arrive by 11 pm, but because of the delay in boarding and other factors it was an hour and half late. The biggest delay in boarding is that you have to go through immigration and you baggage has to be screened. There must of been over a hundred people boarding.

I get a lot of static from custom officials when I show them my Argentine citizenship ID but can’t speak Spanish.   Well, what do you expect? I left Buenos Aires when I was six and no one spoke Spanish then. (I have dual citizenships, both American and Argentinean).

We’ve gotten our bus tickets to head north towards Iguazú. In case you think Greyhound in the United States, forget it. The buses for long distance travel here are luxurious. We booked first class which includes seats that recline enough to sleep well, blankets, food, wine and other amenities. The buses are double decks and we’re right on top first row seats.

Yesterday we took a tour bus and saw some of the City that we had not seen in our previous visits here. The YouTube video shows some of our sights. The pictures are not great, but it’s hard to take good pictures on a moving bus.  Today we have lunch with friends and tonight we leave at seven to head north to our first stop  Esteros del Ibera a wetland preserve. It has an abundance of bird and wildlife, so it should be really interesting.

We’ll be out of internet connection for about three days so will post when we can.

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Civil Engineer
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(530) 263-1091
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DRE# 00669941

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Travel

Buenos Aires, – Casa Rosada (Think White House for Argentina)

casa-rosada

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Casa Rosada

By Judy Pinegar

Feb 12, 2013

With the Subte working a little better we rode to the Plaza De Mayo, a national park. right in front of the Casa Rosada (The Pink House) which used to be both the residence and office of the Argentine President. Now it is just an office, mostly for diplomatic purposes, and on weekends and holidays we found it is now open for tours. We has also discovered that Monday and today were a national holiday “Carnival”, although we saw nothing that looked like a party where we were.

Amazingly different this time… when we were last here, maybe 4 years ago, there was a huge military presence (like an armed guard every 6 feet) all around the park which itself was also in great disrepair, and the Casa Rosada was barricaded off entirely, except for a small museum around to the side. This time the park was beautiful, although very crowded with pigeons, a lot of the barricades were down, and you could walk right up to the Casa Rosada, and we discovered, even take a tour!

It was fantastic, over an hour long in Spanish and English covering three floors. Among our favorites were Eva Peron’s room, the famous portico from which Argentine presidents speak to the people in the plaza, and of course the similar Presidential office (like the Oval Office in the White House).

There was one long hall with pictures of famous Argentine people including actors, musicians and soccer players which had all the other tourist ooing and ahing, but John and I didn’t know anyone! There were two different rooms made up for the President to make major speeches, one was very ornate, with a lot of gold leaf on all the decorative wood pieces. All in all a very beautiful building and a fascinating tour.

The current president is Cristina Elisabet Fernández de Kirchner, now on her second term, although we here grumbling that many Argentines no longer like her. She is supposed to be out after this term, but we also hear she is trying to change the constitution to allow another term. She is the wife of the former president who also had two terms, but has since passed away.

For more information and pictures of all the rooms in the house (including the ones in we were not allowed to take pictures) go to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casa_Rosada

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DRE# 00669941

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