Monday, December 29, 2008

Iguazu Falls, Argentina

Iguazu Falls is located in the extreme northeast tip of Argentina on a little spur of land that extends between Brazil and Paraguay.




It's about 1000 km from Buenas Aires. I flew in the afternoon of Dec. 28 and stayed at a hostel in Iguazu Falls city.

I took the local bus out to Iguazu Natl. Park the next morning.
Walking from the parking lot where the bus dropped us off to the edge of the canyon rim I saw a couple of guinea pigs grazing along the Green path (see map). I wondered if they would be one of the local's dinner later that day.








Walking along the brick-paved path I came across a coati, which is essentially a Latin American raccoon. There was a whole herd? pack? tribe? of them with their young. The little ones were so cute scurrying through the brush with their tails held erect but curved backward at the tip. There must have been a dozen youngster with half a dozen adults.




Not sure if there are several females and one alpha male or if they were made up of several family groups. A couple of them, like this guy, stopped to beg but with signs all around telling people not to feed the animals, they didn't have much chance of getting any people food. Never did get any good pictures of the group as they rummaged through the underbrush.

Iguazu Falls is laid out as two areas, the upper falls(orange path) and the lower falls (blue path). The path to El Diablo falls is marked in red, for reasons that will become obvious.





Of course, I explored the upper falls first and left the lower falls until the afternoon, and hence a long hike up out of the canyon in the extreme heat and humidity--98F and 95%.













Here's an example of a small finger of water that would tumble over the cliff and form a magnificent little waterfall.



2 comments:

Steve Cotton said...

Do you have coatis in Chapala? They are all the Jalisco coast -- and into everything.

Paty said...

We have coatis in this area, although I've never seen one. When they become prolific I imagine we'll see them as road pizza like the racoons and opossums up your way.

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