South America (Brazil) - Day 29 - 30: Foz do Iguaçu, Iguaçu Falls (Brazil side) and Parque das Aves

The plane journey to Foz do Iguaçu was uneventful and saved us a whole heap of time for a very reasonable price. Arriving in the heat of Foz, we decided to chance the local transport; a good move since there is basically only one road into town which the 120 bus frequently uses. For less than a quid we were at our new digs: Tetris Container Hostel. Aside from the obvious videogame reference,  the hostel is actually made out of shipping containers stacked on top of each other like Tetris blocks. It's certainly unique, and our double room with air-con was very comfortable. The weather was grey as usual, so we took a walk into town to see what was around. Towards the centre it seemed like there were a few Christmas choral performances planned (at least according to the placards dotted around), but the sky suddenly darkened and then rain started pouring so we scarpered into a nearby bar (Raffein) which just happened to be hosting happy hour. Or rather, happy four hours. After enjoying the Christmas decorations being put up by the staff, we got through a cocktail each followed by a massive jug of caipirinha and the rain showed no sign of abating, so in a slightly lighter downpour we rushed over to Sushi Hokkei for a mixed platter of hot and cold sushi. I don't know if the cocktails helped, but it tasted amazing.









Incredibly, the rain only got worse. I thought Sao Paulo's storm was bad, but the torrents gushing from the heavens were something else - we had ended up in Jardim da Cerveja for a post-sushi beer, when the force of the water literally pushed out the light fitting. Water started pouring from the ceiling next to the still-lit light, making it the perfect photo opportunity for Gilly to audition for the new Timotei advert, or possibly get electrocuted. Happily, the latter didn't happen.



We met an American guy called Peter and a girl from Amsterdam called Marit in the hostel, and we all decided to head to the Brazilian side of the Iguaçu Falls the next day. They span the Argentina/Brazil border and from all accounts we'd heard that the Argentina side was better, but both sides offer different experiences, so we were keen to do both. It's easily reachable via the same bus that brought us from the airport (in fact, it goes to the airport first), and from there it's just a case of paying the entrance fee and enjoying the walk and the views.

The lead-in is gentle, allowing you to appreciate the falls from a distance. From there you travel along a single path which branches off to various viewpoints to fully appreciate the falls with different backdrops. Getting there early is recommended, as there are dozens of tour companies herding flocks of people into the park. We managed to miss the rush, and over three hundred photos later, we had seen and experienced more water than we thought was possible in one place. The noise is off the scale, and that's even before getting onto the ridiculous walkway which takes you into the full-on spray of the Devil's Throat falls. We got about three-quarters of the way in before the sheer intensity got too much. Even with admittedly rubbish waterproofs on, we were completely drenched. Fate smiled on us though, and blue sky eventually pushed through the cloud to dry us off. The heavy rains that the area had experienced over the previous weeks had washed a lot of debris and soil into the water, which is why they are a brownish colour. It's been over forty years since they ran clear, thanks to ongoing deforestation and climate change.





















We brought some lunch with us, which we had to fiercely guard from the roaming coatis who had been known to bite tourists in an attempt to get their food. Don't be fooled by the cuteness - they're actually vermin. Cute, but rabies-riddled bitey vermin nonetheless, as the signage around the lunch area makes abundantly clear.



Were the falls worth visiting? Absolutely. I would be lying if I'd said I was blown away, but the grey skies may have had a part to play in that. If anything, I considered it a tasty aperitif to the main course in Argentina which we would soon be visiting.

Before that though, we had a bird park to visit. Parque das Aves is one of the best "zoos" I've ever been to, and I use that definition loosely. It's part conservation sanctuary, part rehabilitation centre - a little like the Billabong sanctuary in Australia. The birds are looked after and while penning them is never a substitute for free roaming, they have lots of room in their cages to fly about - especially in the macaw cage where visitors can wander around a huge enclosure with semi-tamed parrots flying all around you. The macaws have been given ropes with blocks of wood on which act as a kind of puzzle; they pull up the rope with their claws and then strip the wood and throw it onto the ground before proceeding to the next bit. When that gets boring, they play around with whatever else is in the vicinity - one of them had even learned how to undo a chain barrier, much to the bemusement of the park staff.

















There is an incredible variety of birds here: cassowaries, flamingoes, hummingbirds, king vultures, and even a harpy eagle - the world's biggest eagle. Not to mention things you wouldn't expect to find in a bird park such as snakes, caimans, turtles, tarantulas and butterflies. I also got to see some African Grey parrots, super-smart birds which have been a favourite since reading Dick King-Smith's Harry's Mad as a kid. And of course toucans, possibly the most expressive and photogenic bird I've come across. Watching them toss peanuts into their mouths never fails to entertain.

If you're stopping to take photos - which you will, constantly, since there's a new delight around every corner - then it'll take about three to four hours to get around the park. If you're going to the falls anyway, visiting is a no-brainer.

We ended the day on a recommendation from Peter - Emporio Com Arte - which was just around the corner, and served up some fruity caipirinhas and lovely local dishes in a kooky café-cum-art gallery.





We had the other side of the falls to go to the next day, even though we hadn't actually planned it. Winging it on a daily basis is one of the many fun parts of travelling.

South America (Brazil) - Day 26 - Day 28: Couchsurfing in Curitiba

By Brazilian standards, Curitiba is classed as a small city, but small is very much relative here. The bus journey was pleasant and uneventful, and our Couchsurfing host Marcos had kindly offered to pick us up from the bus terminal. We knew we’d made a great choice of host when we met him – he was incredibly friendly, spoke great English and was happy to take us to a mall to get some reais exchanged into dollars as well as getting some food. He recommended Madera, a place which claims to serve the best burger in the world. It might not have reached the heights of Vietnam’s Kangaroo Café, but it was magnificent for sure.



Marcos lives in a two-bed apartment in Santa Candida with his affectionate cat Senhõr. Thanks to his programming lead job at IBM he is able to work from home full time, making it very easy for him to host backpackers and get to meet people from all countries and cultures. He is also a fan of gaming, RPGs and Marvel, which meant we all hit it off immediately. So much so, that we spent the entire evening binge-watching Jessica Jones. Unfortunately, despite the efforts of Sao Paulo’s hospital and our time in Floripa, my ear was still not better. It was actually getting worse. I talked to Marcos, and he suggested that I visit a specialist in Curitiba. I was at the point where I just wanted to get better and the thought of jumping through the public health system to satisfy the fickle bureaucracy of our insurers was too much to handle, so I decided to take the cost on the chin and Marcos arranged to take me the following evening.



That left most of the next day free whilst he worked, so we took a trip to the botanical garden in the morning. The sky was once again grey but it stayed dry, and the garden was compact but pretty enough to get a few photos here and there whilst I played around with different shutter speeds on my camera, practicing taking shots of water and examining the world's campest park path.































Saute Gastronomia beckoned us to more por kilo action down the road and the place needs to be commended for its honesty – I left my camera dangling from my chair and only realised five minutes after we’d left the place. We legged it back fearing the worst, only for the waitress at the entrance to reassure me that they’d found it and everything was fine. Incredible. Curitiba has a reputation for being one of the nicest, safest cities in the country and this definitely helped reinforce that opinion. In Rio, I suspect the camera would probably have changed hands three times before we’d even left the restaurant.

We got back in mid-afternoon so that we could avoid rush hour on the way to the private hospital Marcos had booked me into. The place was a sprawling labyrinth of marble floors, with each doctor having a specific secretary sat outside their office. The contrast to the public sector offering is staggering, even more so than in the UK. My doctor was a chap in his late 50s called Marcelo who spoke pretty good English and seemed very competent to my non-medically trained eyes. He diagnosed me with another ear infection pretty much straight away, pooh-poohed the medication I had been prescribed before, and gave me another set of tablets and eardrops with specific instructions for usage. By the time we got back it was almost 8pm thanks to the remainder of the rush hour traffic, and I was £80 poorer but more hopeful that I might actually be able to get over this illness.

One of the great things about Couchsurfing is experiencing things you’d never have found on your own. Most hosts are keen to show visitors the best parts of where they live, and give them a taste of the local culture. Marcos was no different, and took us out in the evening to what could only be described as a seasonal wine-deli extravaganza. It combined a tourist-friendly, fairylight-strewn building with wine-tasting and a huge variety of cheeses, meats and other delights, all topped off with more Christmas decorations than should feasibly be possible to fit in a shop. We’d sampled the acquired taste of Brazilian wine back in Paraty, so we weren’t expecting the wines on offer here to be that much better. Granted, some of the reds were pretty “interesting” and the one white I tried was pretty much undrinkable, but there were a couple of bottles of red which were fine, and the cava equivalent was great. The grappa interlude may also have helped adjust the tastebuds somewhat, and when the wine staff lined up a second line of six reds we could probably have drunk anything put in front of us without complaint. It’s clear to see why all of the Santas on the stairs appeared half-cut.















All of the wine worked up an appetite, and the morsels of genuinely enjoyable cheese and meat on offer weren’t sating us, so Marcos took us to a local place he knew called Casa dos Arcos where we shared a fantastic dish of lamb and roast potatoes between the three of us. It was meant for two people; it could easily have fed four and it took its toll as I nodded off in the front of the car on the way home like an old man. It was definitely not the alcohol, OK?

Curitiba plays host to the Oscar Niemeyer museum, which was the next day’s destination. The creator of Brazil’s capital loved his curving architecture, and he was responsible for pretty much all of the most interesting buildings in the country – including the museum itself, shaped like a giant eye. Niemeyer never retired, and carried on working until his death at 104 years old. Hopefully he took a holiday at some point. The museum’s exhibitions were as variable as any modern art collection, i.e. whether you like them or not will be entirely down to personal taste. For me, they ranged from the bad (several walls of overexposed Polaroids) to the good (spooky figures made from clay) to the excellent (a series of kinetic light-based installations). Curitiba may not be high on Brazil’s list of tourist destinations, but the museum is certainly worth a visit if you find yourself in the city.





















After lunch at Bolhero over the road, we took a walk to the centre afterwards to look at some of the colonial buildings, a few monuments that had been sadly defaced with graffiti, and an impressive cathedral. Ice cream at Cold Stone Creamery took the edge off the unexpected heat of the day, and before we took the bus back, we explored the nearby Passeio Publico which is a kind of miniature zoo filled with hundreds of exotic birds and some rodents.











We finished the day back at Marcos’s place to round off the day with the final two episodes of Marvel’s new series and a farewell photo (Senhõr was feeling sulky and didn’t want to take part). Incidentally, the mural in the background on Marcos’s wall was painted by another Couchsurfer in just two days as a thank you for letting her stay.



And that rounds up the CS culture completely - what could have been a sterile stay in a business-focused city was turned into a memorable experience by our wonderful host, and we are incredibly grateful to Marcos for letting us share his apartment for a few days. In typical generous fashion, he even offered to take us to the airport bus stop the next morning. We’d decided to fly to Foz do Iguacu rather than get a bus since the flights were relatively cheap – the Iguaçu Falls on the Brazil and Argentina borders awaited, and we were keen to see if the hype would be worth the wait.