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The alarm went off at 8am and we quickly got dressed and drove to Paudimar campground where we would spend the day looking after Mia whilst Claudia and Uwe went on a tour to see the Argentinian side of Iguazo Falls.
Mia was truly happy to see us and we could hardly calm her down! Claudia and Uwe didn't run around in circles but they were also happy to see us again! Uwe said he'd already taken Mia for a walk at 7am this morning and went right past our motorhome. Mia knew the vehicle and ran around us 6 times!! Sorry, but we were still fast asleep after our very long day the day before!
Claudia, Uwe and Rainer left at 9am on their tour. We parked our motorhome in one of the spots on the campground and Kirsten took Mia for a walk. Mia knew her way around and took Kirsten to see some puppies in a cage with their mom!
Kirsten took her out for another two walks but it was quite hot and humid so she stayed underneath the motorhome the rest of the time (Mia, not Kirsten!). She's a very well behaved dog and it was no trouble at all for us to take care of her for the day.
Claudia and Uwe got back around 5-30pm and had had a great time. We all went into the pool to cool off and we could even watch the Champions League football matches from the pool! Later we were taken out for a meal at the campground restaurant as a thank you. I ordered a really good pepperoni pizza and Kirsten went for the chicken with rice, beans and chips. The food was very good.
Behind the restaurant there was a local football match being played and whilst we were eating one of the players must have had a really wild shot at the goal because the ball came over the roof, hit me on my arm and bounced onto the table smashing Uwe's beer bottle!!! One of the players came to fetch the ball, saw what had happened and apologised by buying another beer for Uwe!
The next day we went for breakfast which is included in the camping price. It was basically cake or bread and jam plus watermelon. Then we set off to get to the Brazilian side of the Iguazu waterfalls. We had already done the tour in 2002 but the falls are well worth seeing again.
We walked 15 minutes to get to the main road and then got onto bus 120 that went to the visitor centre for the waterfalls. The entrance fee is 63-60 R$ per person ($20 US dollars) and includes the shuttle bus along the road to the falls. There are several stops and plenty of other activities and extra tours for those that want to pay the prices. They are quite expensive though - $100 for a safari tour and boat ride is just one example.
We simply got off the bus after approx 10km and walked the main 1.2km trail to the falls. Opposite the bus stop was the Belmont Hotel where we were allowed to take a walk around the lobby. That gave the rest of the tourists a chance to start off on the trail so we might get some of the viewpoints to ourselves!
We had a really good time walking to all of the viewpoints, spotting lots of animals and butterflies. It might only have been 1.2km but and it took us 2.5 hours!! Too much to see and too many photo opportunities. Coaties, millipedes, butterflies (800 species!) and iguanas. I spotted a really tiny one and later a large one that everyone else had overlooked because they were too busy taking photos at one of the viewpoints for the falls!
At El Garganta del Diablo we put on the ponchos that Claudia and Uwe had lent us to head out onto the boardwalk to the main viewpoint. Everyone gets wet from the spray but we were the only ones in ponchos. It wasn't really worth it though because we had already sweated buckets in the high humidity.
At the end of the trail there were various fast food places and a restaurant. We were hungry so we decided to go for the all you can eat buffet at the restaurant. There was quite an assortment of hot dishes and a salad buffet. There were signs on everything that said what the dishes were in Portuguese and English. One of the signs said "Chicken (overcooked)"!!! I think they meant roasted!
We were completely stuffed and decided to try and walk a bit of the extra calories off. So we got the lift down to the main falls viewpoint again and took the walking route back up to the top. At around 4-30pm we got the shuttle bus back to the visitor centre and only had a 5 minute wait for bus 120 back.
We really enjoyed our day out at the falls and had very good weather even though the forecast had been for rain! It was sunny with blue skies but by the time we got back to the campground the dark clouds were building! We joined Claudia and Uwe in the pool but before that, Mia got her treat for looking after our Winnietwo for the day.
Iguazu Falls
We spent that evening with Claudia, Uwe and Rainer. The next day we would all be leaving; Rainer went first at around 11-30am; Claudia and Uwe left at 1pm to drive back to Paraguay; and we wanted to leave at around 2pm, heading east for the coast. This time we had to say goodbye because it would be a while before we would see our friends again. Mia also seemed to know and only just managed to give us a very weak high five. She was very unhappy!
About 40 minutes after Claudia and Uwe left a heavy storm came over. Kirsten was cleaning our toilet in the bathroom but heard strong winds coming out of the blue. She ran back to help me close all the doors and skylights. We only just managed in time before the heavens opened. And open they certainly did!! Bath tubs full of water started pouring down over us and the ground was flooded within minutes!! Branches were being broken off from the trees and flung around by the wind.
Thankfully the storm only lasted 30 minutes but it was certainly hefty. Once it had stopped raining we carefully opened the door and saw a large tree branch next to our motorhome – we'd been lucky that it hadn't hit us!
By 3pm we could finally leave and went to the International campground in the town to check out storage possibilities but they wanted approx $90 per month for an outside spot. When the owner pointed out large tennis ball size holes in the roof from a hail storm we decided it might not be where we wanted to leave our motorhome!!
It was raining again and our next stop was a large Muffato Supermarket to stock up and get something for a late lunch. We were just tucking into really good granary baguettes with ham and tomato when someone knocked on our door. Uwe had parked right behind us!! They had sat out the storm at a large shopping mall and now needed to do some shopping.
Well we knew we would see them again some time so it was a really nice surprise when it was only a few hours later!! Uwe and Mia came inside to chat whilst Claudia went shopping and we finished off our lunch. Mia helped us with the ham!!
When it was time to leave Uwe carried Mia back to their motorhome so she didn't get her paws wet! Mia didn't mind but at least they wouldn't have to clean the floor again! Then it really was goodbye as we both drove off to a traffic light where we turned left and Uwe, Claudia and Mia turned right. (Sniff, sniff!) So long and take care. We're going to miss you guys. We've really enjoyed our time together and are looking forward to meeting up again.
We managed to drive 150km east through heavy rain and two tolls. We were aiming for a petrol station marked on iOverlander as a nice quiet spot for the night. Well it was very quiet because it was closed!!! I'd already been driving in the dark and we didn't want to go any further so we pulled into a side street nearby and parked there for the night.
