Las Cataratas… ¿Quién necesita más?

Our last program trip was going to Iguazú Falls.  Without a doubt I would recommend this place to anyone that asked me.  It is actually currently a contestant for the 7 Wonders of the World.  I haven’t been to many of the places that are on the list, but this is by far one of God’s many wonders.  The drive to the falls from Rosario was about 22 hours, muy largo.  Luckily there were stops along the way.  The first place that we went to was the San Ignacio Ruins. It was very cool to walk around where Missionaries had gone to preach to the aborigines and see what was their entire community.  Their “houses” were about 15 ft x 15 ft and inside each one lived about 5-6 people.  There were also the main pillars left from where their church used to stand.  One of my favorite parts was seeing a tree that had actually grown around one of their pillars because it just shows how old that little town really is.

Thankfully when we actually arrived in Puerto Iguazú we were given the day to rest, which most of us spent out by the pool.  I can now officially say that I have played chicken as well, which is weird because people have been playing that game my entire life.  Anyway, our hotel was gorgeous and it was nice to be out of the city and surrounded by jungle for a change.  The following day we went into the jungle to zip-line over the canopy.  We ended up zip-lining for about 800 meters, which went way too fast for my liking but was still entirely worth it.  Afterwards we went rappelling somewhere in the jungle.  This part was a lot of fun because we didn’t know that we were going to get drenched when the day began, but in actuality we were rappelling through a waterfall.  It was a blast and since we were already soaked from the activity the majority of us jumped into the water and swam around a bit! 

Not long after that we went to “Las Tres Banderas (The Three Flags).”  This is a place at the very tip of Argentina where you can stand and see Brazil and Paraguay at the same time.  It was SO amazing because each country has their flag colors on a statue and you can see each one.  Each country is separated by a river, either Río Parana or Río Iguazú and it seemed so crazy to me that if I simply crossed the river I’d be in another country. 

Even later that day we went to a wildlife refuge.  I think my favorite part of this was seeing animals within a foot from my face that I’ve never even dreamed of seeing in person.  We saw parrots, toucans, eagles, monkeys and a ton more.  We even ran into an encounter with one of the wild monkeys and she wouldn’t let us continue on the pathway.  She was very angry and I’m not exactly sure why but it definitely added excitement to the trip.

To continue our incredibly long day we went to La Aripuca, which is a place where they use trees that have fallen down naturally to build these awesome looking “tree houses” and really cool furniture.  I wish I could have taken more pictures while I was there, but sadly my camera died.  The essence of the place was to show the importance of trees and rather than being a place where you could buy really cool furniture, it was trying to show the need to conserve trees. I thought it was very cool and I thoroughly enjoyed stumbling upon the story of the three trees posted on some random tree stump. :)

The following day was the main point of our trip and what I would call the main attraction.  Now in all honesty, words can’t even being to describe this place.  It is one of the widest waterfalls in the world and I can’t imagine stumbling upon this before nowadays when it is so commonly known.  The first part we went to was “La Garganta del Diablo. (The Devin’s Throat.)”  What I had a hard time wrapping my finger around in this part of the falls was how so much water could continually rush down the side of this cliff without ceasing.  It blew my mind. 

 My Conversation Teacher :)

The next part that we saw was the upper falls, followed by the lower falls.  These were so incredibly amazing that it was so hard to just let it soak in.  I’m not sure how God did it, but I continually found myself thinking about how all-powerful He really is. Our adventures didn’t end just by looking at the falls, but we actually got to take a boat and go under the falls.  Luckily we were prepared to get wet that day and most of us were wearing our swimsuits.  It was so much fun going under the waterfall!! The water was hitting your face so hard that you could barely look up, which seems absurd to say that you would actually enjoy something like that but the truth is… you’re never going to get that experience ever again, therefore I was all about enjoying every minute of it!  We were even able to pass through the middle of the river, which means I have officially been in Brazilian territory! Oh how I love traveling!

We finished the trip with a stop at the mines where we saw beautiful purple gems inside rocks.  To be honest I could barely understand our guide so I didn’t gain much knowledge from the tour, but the gems were pretty. :)  Afterwards we were able to conclude our trip with about 5 movies and we arrived back in Rosario around 5:30 in the morning.  With just enough time to take a quick nap before heading to class later that day. Gotta love it!

In conclusion, this trip was most definitely one of my favorites! Although I am really looking forward to going to Uruguay next week as well.  It’s crazy to think that this trip is almost over, but I have surely enjoyed every minute of it.  One of these days I will have to share some of my every day experiences with you guys, but for now this will have to do.

I love you all and I can’t wait to see you again! Besos a todos!

Estoy en las manos de Dios. :)

Traveler’s Time

El Fin De Semana Larga (The Long Weekend)

A few weeks ago we had a weekend from Thursday through Monday because of Rosarino and Argentine Holidays.  It’s really sad to think that I don’t know what they were, but the long weekend was very exciting! Ten other students and I decided to go to Mendoza, which is a city and province located on the west side of Argentina.  We left on a Wednesday night and began the 13-hour bus ride to Mendoza.  We stayed in a hostel called “La Casa De Mhayl.” This was officially my first hostel experience and I absolutely loved it!

Day 1:

The first day we got there we all decided to go on a bike and wine tour in Maipú.  I must admit that it wasn’t what I was expecting because none of the vineyards are in season right now.  But aside from that, it was still gorgeous!  I loved being able to leisurely bike down a road that was lined with trees on both side, such a wonderful sight to see.  The first stop that we went to was the Museum of Wine.  Although when many people hear the word museum the first thought that comes to mind is boring, I thoroughly enjoyed it.  I loved hearing the history and how it all works, said entirely in Spanish.  Of course, there are bits and pieces that I didn’t quite understand, but it was still fun.  Of course on this tour, my favorite stops were the chocolate factories.  Most of us tried the liqueurs and the delicious chocolates and I even bought some with the intent of bringing them back to the US, but I must say they definitely didn’t last that long, sorry!  Aside from the chocolate, the one vineyard that I actually went wine tasting at was very unique.  All of the old fermentation tanks can no longer be used because they would break, so instead they are used as wine cellars.  It was really cool to see all the wine bottles stacked up on the inside of the tank.  The best part, in my opinion, about wine tasting in some of the places in Argentina is that they don’t export to other countries, so the wine that we got to taste was entirely unique to Argentina. :)

Day 2:

The real adventures began on Friday when Tiffany, Lindsay and I all went paragliding over the foothills of the Andes Mountains!!! Definitely the experience of a lifetime! First, you get to wear this HUGE backpack/seat thing and then you get to literally run off the side of a mountain.  It is quite a rush being told to run and then all of a sudden not feeling anything under your feet and yet you are still moving forward.  My guides name was Alejandro and he was super sweet until we ran into a bit of complications.  Apparently you can get motion sickness while you are paragliding.  I definitely didn’t know this, and even if I would have known I don’t think it would have stopped me from going because I never get horribly motion sick.  This time was different though.  I started feeling sick so I asked Alejandro if people ever throw up with they are flying, luckily he told me that they have before so I wasn’t feeling too bad that I was feeling like I was going to as well.  Not long after that I definitely threw up, not only all over my face and jacket, but all over Alejandro as well.  I can’t even begin to explain how horrible I felt after that.  Of course, our adventure quickly came to an end and well that was the end of it.  Still well worth it if you ask me; the view of the city and the mountains was incredible spectacular.  So many times I found myself simply in awe of the splendors that God created!

While flying in the air!!

Day 3:

Our excursion for the third day was trekking, rappelling and hot springing, again in the foothills of the Andes.  I’ve definitely learned that I love being outdoors and doing things that require exercise.  Opposite to the first day when I learned that I like to ride bikes at a slow pace, this day I learned that I like to hike fast.  I must take after my mother. :)  The trekking was fabulous and the rappelling even more because I miss rock climbing so much!  The hot spring was a different story entirely.  We thought it would be really cool because it was a natural hot spring on the side of the Mendoza River, but in actuality the water was all murky and there were too many people for the little pool.  I’d call it s a let down and I think everyone with me would agree.  Looking at the positive side, we did get to go to the Mendoza River and it was very pretty because you could tell that it had carved its way through these mountains and was now a nice little canyon.  After that adventure, regardless of the fact that we were all drained from the day, we got on a bus once again to spend our night driving to Chile.

Day 4:

It was never really in my plans to go to Chile. (Unless I had the chance to see Amy, of course!) But, since we were only 5-6 hours away I knew that I couldn’t let the opportunity pass me by.  My least favorite part, and also maybe one of the most rewarding, was when we had to stop on the top of the Andes Mountains around 1 in the morning in order to go through customs.  I hate going through customs in another country because you never know if something will go wrong, and there is definitely a language barrier.  Anyway, regardless of the fact that we had to wake up from our already insufficient sleep, I was very grateful because seeing the stars over the Andes was incredible!! I’m a sucker for stars and being able to see SO many at one time was amazing.  Stars constantly remind me of how awesome our God really is and I couldn’t have asked for a better reminder that night.  Plus, being able to see the consolation of Orion’s Belt reminded me that no matter how many miles from home I may be, I’m still not that far. :)

So we arrived at Santiago, Chile around 4 in the morning and scrambled around to find a bus that would take us to Valparaíso.  Valparaíso is a little town on the Pacific coast only a couple hours away from Santiago.  When we arrived the city was completely dead! Of course it was only 6 and it was a Sunday, but there were literally no people on the streets.  Of course, even if there aren’t people on the streets there are always dogs on the streets in South America.  I think we managed to have about 12 dogs following us around as our own personal wolf pack.  It’s crazy to me because they will literally protect you.  They will try to stop cars from driving so that you can cross the street, or bark at the man walking by himself in the opposite direction.  It is so bizarre to me, but it is the same things that dogs in Rosario do as well.

If you ever get the chance to go to Chile I would suggest going to Valparaíso, it isn’t necessarily the cleanest city, but it is definitely full of character.  All the houses are different colors and they are built up on the hillside around a port so you can see a ton of them.  The streets are also extremely full of character.  There is graffiti everywhere you look and some of the streets are not streets for cars, but rather staircases that lead you to houses or another part of the city.  It was very fun to have the opportunity to simply explore the city.  Also, getting to touch the Pacific Ocean in another continent was rather entertaining. 

I’ve come to realize that the majority of the time there are always mishaps when traveling.  We thought that there was supposed to be a time chance between Argentina and Chile, and supposedly there should be, but apparently there isn’t.  And since we were off on what time we thought it was, we ended up missing our bus to get back to Santiago, which was scary because we had a specific time that our bus from Chile to Argentina was leaving and we couldn’t miss it or else we would have to wait 24 hours for the next one.  So, this being said, we were in quite a rush to catch the next available bus.  We managed to verbalize what had happened and the guy helping up was able to get all 5 of us onto a different bus that wasn’t leaving for another 45 minutes and that bus would only give us 15 minutes to get to our next bus.  Luckily, we made it! Of course, we had to run from bus terminal to bus terminal, but we caught the bus and made it back to Mendoza the next morning around 5 am.

Day 5:

Our last day in Mendoza was very relaxing! I had no plans, and was excited to get to simply explore the city.   We walked down one of the main strips to have lunch and then some of us headed over to The Park of General San Martín, which is HUGE and gorgeous!  I wish I would have been able to spend more time there, just relaxing or going some of the natives and drinking some mate (Super common thing the drink if I haven’t mentioned it before.) Nothing special happened the rest of the day, just walked around and looked at the beautiful houses.  The main difference that I have found between Rosario and Mendoza is that Mendoza actually has space in between the buildings and not everything is 9 stories high.  There are actually houses in Mendoza and yards that go along with them.  Of course, in Rosario they have houses too, but they are more for the richer people and I live downtown so you don’t see many houses.  I’ve come to the conclusion that if I had to choose a city in Argentina to live, or possibly retire to, it would be Mendoza. :)

So, although I spent 4 out of the 6 nights on the trip sleeping on a bus and I came home incredibly exhausted I am so glad that I did it! I was able to visit Chile and extend my tourist visa, which I needed to do anyway, I went paragliding and much more, plus I have officially managed to travel across South America from East to West by bus!  That’s not something I had ever intended to do, but I am so grateful that God has given me this opportunity.  I surely have been blessed!

I definitely miss everyone more and more! I hope everything is going great back home! Besos! (Kisses!- very common to say here as another form of bye/love ya/see ya later… expect me to use it when I get home J)

Estoy en las manos de Dios. :)