I had researched and hoped to visit Iguazú Falls during my travel trip in 2022 but unfortunately the timing and details just didn’t fall into place at that time. Imagine my surprise and delight when I learned that we could visit the area on our school break while studying abroad! 🎉

Declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984 and voted as one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature in 2011, the waterfalls in Iguazú are part of two national parks, one in Foz do Iguaçu (Brazil) and the other in Puerto Iguazú (Argentina). We flew to Puerto Iguazú from Buenos Aires and were immediately overwhelmed by the heat and humidity there! It is certainly a tropical area and was 98 degrees Fahrenheit when we visited the park. 🥵

On the first evening, we walked through the little town of Puerto Iguazú to an overlook where the Paraná River divides Argentina from Brazil and Paraguay. In the picture below, standing in Argentina, Brazil is to the right and Paraguay is to the left with the pretty bridge connecting the two.

The Falls! 💧

I was lucky enough to visit Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe in 2021, and Niagara Falls in the U.S. in 2023, but Iguazú Falls are the most dramatic, picturesque and spectacular falls that I have ever seen. It might be that we just lucked out with the season and the amount of water going over the falls, but there is a place called Garganta de diablo (or Devil’s Throat) where the park has a platform right next to the water and it was really amazing (I marked where the platform is in the first picture). It’s hard to describe the scale and amount of water right in front of you on the platform and the pictures below don’t really do it justice, but needless to say that I was very impressed! 🤩

Trip to Paraguay! 🇵🇾🚕🇧🇷

I was surprised to learn how close we were to Paraguay when we arrived to Iguazu Falls! Having never been to Paraguay, I wondered if we could figure out a way to visit while being in such close vicinity? Argentina and Paraguay do not have a direct connection over the Paraná River, but Brazil and Paraguay do via The International Friendship Bridge. If I could figure out how to get from Argentina into Brazil and to the bridge, we could walk across and be in Paraguay!

A few of my fellow classmates were up for the adventure of seeing both countries and our coordinator helped us negotiate a taxi. The city nearest the bridge in Paraguay has a reputation for being a bit higher in crime and possibly dangerous for tourists, so we decided to walk into the country and come back to spend the day in Brazil.

We stopped at a delicious Japanese 🍣🍱 restaurant (Brazil is home to the largest Japanese population outside of Japan) for lunch and explored a cute cafe afterward. At the end of the day, we visited a touristy area that ended up having music and a live theater show before returning to Argentina for dinner with the rest of our classmates. Though it was a bit challenging traveling with a group of 19-21 year olds who didn’t always have the best time management skills 🤦🏻‍♀️🤪I was excited to have been able to visit another country, making Paraguay the 46th country that I’ve been to, yay! 🎊 🌎

Thank you for following the blog! It’s been 6 weeks in South America and the trip this week really boosted my mood, was a great opportunity to get to know my fellow classmates better, and a nice break away from the allergens plaguing me in Montevideo. 😉🤣 So a win-win all around! I hope everyone has had a great start to October! 😃