A Bit Rich

That evening, back at Hotel Germano, I asked the receptionist for somewhere mas tipico de Paraguay, not sure (or caring) if the Spanish is correct, and she directed us to somewhere that she admitted was not tipico tipico but they had a few dishes apparently. At the restaurant, which seemed to be an Italian restaurant, I asked the waiter for something tipico and he told me they didn't have anything. So I just ordered a steak done in the house style, which turned out to be stuffed with ham and cheese, and garnished with some more of the same as well as some mushroom sauce. Just a little bit rich!

Extreme steak

In the morning we went shopping in the bajo part of town, which is due to be flooded as part of a dam project, but for the moment, where all the market stalls are to be found. There wasn't as much there as we'd been hoping, nor was it as cheap, but my trouser situation was really out of hand since my “best” pair of long trousers' fly had gone and was only held together by safety pins. Under pressure, I bought two pairs of shorts I didn't really like for more money than they should surely have cost in that country.

Market in Bajo Encarnacion

This will all be flooded soon

Seems they've already started the flooding

Mission accomplished, we loaded onto the bus back to Argentina. Since we had some time, we thought it best to stamp out of Paraguay, which of course meant getting off the bus and waiting for the next one, which stopped and waited at the Argentinian side for everyone to get their stamp. This time, though, there were already people waiting and, by the time we got through border control, our bus was full and pulling off. Joanne ran after it for a bit shouting at the driver, but there was no point: it was full. So it was another wait for the next bus, which we made sure we got on, again leaving lots of people behind. Only a few hundred metres past the border, the bus stopped and the driver indicated everyone should get off, though I didn't catch why. I went up and asked him aren't we going to the terminal and again, I didn't quite get his answer, so we just got off too, at which point we saw why: the bus had a flat tyre. Considering the bus had been so full that not everyone waiting at the border had been able to get on, and there had been people waiting from the previous bus when we arrived at the border, we didn't fancy our chances with the next bus, but the driver just told us to wait. The next bus actually had enough space for everyone, so maybe the previous two were during rush hour.

Rickety old local bus

We had left lots of time to spare before the bus we had to catch in Posadas, but now it was starting to get a bit tight. Luckily it wasn't much further to the terminal and we were soon checked in for the bus. When we got on the bus, I was very disappointed; we had paid extra for cama rather than the semi-cama we had taken before, but it turned out, for me, to be less comfortable than the cheaper option because, in an effort to make everything seem more solid and luxurious I think, there is no space under the chair in front, where you have to jam your feet to be comfortable if you are not short. Instead everything is built to look like a solid unit right down to the floor. The journey just got worse: cama is downstairs on most buses, but so is the toilet, which meant that we were kept awake by people banging the door, then by all manor of hideous odours. As if that wasn't bad enough, the military stopped the bus three times during the night to get on, check people's passports, and on two occasions, removed bags from the boot and demanded to know who the owner was. Thankfully it was never us.

written by  The Happy Couple on October 13, 2009 from Encarnacion, Paraguay
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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