Honeymooning around the world: Breathtaking Iguazu Falls and Das Aves bird park!

After city life in Rio, it was time to continue to Foz do Iguacu and the Iguazu waterfalls. We had only seen pictures of it before and it looked amazing. It was something that we felt we have to see!

A part of the falls from the Brazilian side

We flew from Rio to Iguazu and found a public bus that went straight to the center of the town. So, let’s start with the town and our hotel. We arrived quite early so we had time to walk around in the town and quickly noticed that there is basically nothing to do or see. There were few restaurants (of which none especially worth mentioning), hotels and cheap clothes stores. But the clothes looked cheap too, so we couldn’t utilize that 😝 We stayed at Hotel 15 Julho. It was difficult to find a reasonably priced hotel or hostel in the town and this one was one that had better recommendations and still in our budget. But the hotel had so many things wrong, such as terrible beds, extremely loud AC, poor breakfast, staff that didn’t speak a word English, etc. Oh, well.

Normal street view in Foz do Iguacu

Our room at 15 Julho

On our second day we wanted to visit the Brazilian side of the falls. It was an easy access – we just took the public bus 120 (same that goes to the airport) and stopped at the final stop. There were a lot of people queuing for the tickets but we saved about ½ hour by buying our tickets from a machine with credit card. Don’t know why others didn’t do that as well…? We then drove a while by bus to the start of the trail. There is one trail on the Brazilian side and it’s very nice. One sees different waterfalls from different angles and there are many places where one can stop to take a photo or two. The most famous part of the Brazilian side must be the Devil’s throat where one walks on a bridge and goes on top of the waterfalls and gets completely wet from all the water coming from other falls. It was cool and interesting!

Kissss 😗

Getting soaked next to a big waterfall

We had been exploring how we would get to the Argentinian side of the waterfalls. Many people go with a tour group organized by their hotels but when traveling independently, many choose to take a bus. BUT, we discussed this with a local person and he told that first one needs to take a bus to the Brazilian side of the border and go through the paperwork. Then one needs to wait for a bus that takes to the Argentinian side of the border (there is quite a long way to walk if one doesn’t take a bus) and there one needs to go through immigration as well. And after that one needs to wait again for a bus that takes to the starting point of the falls. We heard that it takes normally about 2 – 3 hours to get to the other side of the falls by bus. We started thinking… 4 – 6 hours on a bus or waiting for a bus didn’t sound very inviting. We were looking for a tourist information in Iguacu and found a taxi stand that also worked as tourist information. There was a man who asked in English whether if he could help us. He gave us a map of both sides of the falls and told that he could drive us to the Argentinian side and pick us up for 200 reals, which is about 60 euros. We quickly calculated that the price for all the bus rides would be about the same so we booked the taxi ride. It ended up being a very good decision!

Our driver, Jair, has lived for a long time in Iguacu and he told small, interesting things about the falls and the town during our taxi rides. He was extremely helpful with the immigration parts – he knew where to go, which forms to fill, where to pay, etc. We were glad that we booked him! Below you can find his contact details in case you want to use him, BUT, the number is actually +55 (45) 99125 2451. There is the country code and one '9' missing from his card.

The Argentinian side has three trails. The first one starts with a train ride and then an apprx. 20-minute walk to the other side of Devil’s throat. Here one was on top of all the waterfalls and the view was spectacular. Luckily we had our rain coats with us because otherwise we would’ve gotten soaked! 😜

Argentinian side - even more water than on the Brazilian side!

Weird birds hanging around behind the waterfalls!

The second trail is called the Upper trail and it goes on top of many waterfalls and one has again spectacular views! The third and last trail is called the Lower trail and there one gets to see many of the waterfalls from down to up. There is one point where one almost stands under a waterfall!

Doesn't this look like from a fairy tail?

All the trails are beautiful, but we did prefer the Argentinian side. It was more versatile and one really saw how the water masses moved around. We learned that there goes about 1,8 million liters of water down the falls every second and that a few years back, the amount was 20 times more!!! That is when the bridges to Devil’s throat got destroyed by the water masses and needed to be repaired. Also, not too long ago, the falls were almost completely dry due to lack of rain! That would be a huge disappointment!

So, this is the normal amount of water - imagine this x20!!

There were two things we didn’t enjoy that much at the falls. First: there is a possibility to go and see the falls from a helicopter. The helicopters were flying on top of us constantly and the sound was not something you would like to hear in the nature. Second: they organize speed boat rides in the river and those boats were filled with a lot of people all the time. Again – a lot of noise that doesn’t belong to such beautiful nature park and the pollution also is something that we would wish they would think about. We heard from a local that the helicopter and boat companies pay the government and that’s why they are allowed to fly and drive there. Ah, corruption, corruption.

But other than those two, the place is beautiful and we are extremely glad that we got the chance to visit both sides of the falls. Pictures cannot show what they really look like – you should go there yourself! 😊

We also visited the bird park called Das Aves next to the Falls. The birds were beautiful and there was a big variety of them as well. Some of them were in bigger cages and you could walk next to them, which was nice. But we felt quite confused after the walk in the park. Many of the birds were in rather small cages and they didn't have enough space to fly around. Also, there was the same, constant noise from the helicopters that was actually quite loud! We cannot see the birds and other animals feeling relaxed in such environment. 😢 Also, in the end, there was a guy playing different instruments with a loudspeaker next to him. We understand he was there to entertain people but the noise was loud and right next to some bird cages. Sighhh...