Day 16

This gave me about two hours to spare (during which time I probably could have hired a taxi to take me to the ruins) and in the rain there really wasn't anything I could do but hang around the bus station. Admittedly, however, for the first time this trip I really began to feel like a traveler. There were no other tourists on the train (or at least not in Pullman class) or on the bus.

The bus traveled through mostly rainforest area and I quickly realized why we are losing so much rainforest -- every couple of Miles was a logging company. I've never seen anything quite like it. Each enterprise seemed small, but taken together it is clear that the impact is tremendous. There was some attempt at reforestation, although ti seems that those little trees will take forever to grow.

Also along the way we stopped in several small towns. They all seemed clean and some had very nice homes -- quite a contrast to the one room wooden shacks we passed in both the train and along the main road.

The bus arrived in Puerto Iguazu around 5:30, an hour later than I expected. I checked into a cute hosteleria near the bus station, showered, and trapsed into town

Being Sunday evening, the town was dead; being a tourist destination, the tourist office was open. So in I went, for 5 - 10 minutes of essentially useless information. So now I am sitting in a cafe in the center of town watchign it wake up for dinner.

As I walked further on, I met up with a fellow Lonely Planet traveler -- Matthew from Australia. We shared a pizza and conversation and agreed to meet the next day to explore the Brazilian side of the falls.

written by  shoshtrvls on March 15, 1992 from Puerto Iguazu, Argentina
from the travel blog: Antarctica and South America (1992)
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