While my big ticket item was to see the Iguazu Falls I also had a few little tasks I want to do first. The main two being, wash the bike and get the 15,000 kilometre service done on it. I think I’ll write about the Falls in a separate post. But I need to explain the little complication or idiosyncrasy of the Falls and the cities around them. I’m currently in Brazil in the city of Foz do Iguaçu (Pop. 260,000). Directly across the Parana River is the city of Ciudad del Este (Pop. 340,000) which is in Paraguay. And there is a tee intersection of the river just to the south of these two cities where the Iguazu River flows into the Parana River. The Iguazu River is the border river between Brazil and Argentina and its border city of Puerto Iguazu (Pop. 85,000).

So basically you have 3 cities in 3 different countries based around a river junction. Currently there are only two bridges but a third one is well under construction. And unbeknown to me, unbeknownst is actually a real word, which I must have never written before. And can be in either form, but the latter is the Americanised version, so we’ll go with the former. Anyway, unbeknown to me the Iguazu Fall are actually about 25kms upstream from the cities. Not in the middle of town as I had assumed when I booked my hotel near the river so I could walk to the falls.

My hotel ,Iguazu Flats, was nice and about $30AUD a night without breakfast. I booked in for 2 nights and then found the Honda shop was just up the road and they were able to service the bike for me. And they also had a washing booth and for $12.00 they wash it for you. After my hard ride through the mud in Bolivia it was nice to know someone who washes motorbikes for a living was doing the job. The service was good but needed a translation app. They replaced the missing bolt, changed the oil and the filter, and then also changed the front brake pads. The latter was done with WhatsApp messages and I don’t think they really needed to be done yet,  but it was nice to get them done in a very professional looking Honda workshop. The whole service and wash and brake pads cost $160AUD. They also suggested that I’ll need a new back tyre soon, but I’ll hang out a bit longer for that.

I was enjoying my hotel and decided to stay an extra 2 nights but due to them being booked out one night and me not booking correctly on my phone for the other night, I ended up have to move out. The guy suggested the hotel next door. I enquired there and they had space and a quick currency conversion showed it was a bit cheaper so I booked a night. I paid and then the amount came through on my phone as double the price of the other hotel. Turns out I’d been fiddling with my currency convertor app and had it set on the wrong currency.  So I was paying double, over sixty bucks for a hotel that was only half as good as where I was already staying. The only plus was that it was easy to move all my stuff next door. And I had only booked one night. My whole life in a lift. Except for the bike of course.

I had a couple of nice feeds in Brazil and they always seem to give you an extra plate. Just more dishes to wash. And the beer bottle is always in a special stubby cooler. There was a fancy steakhouse that had a big sign outside saying genuine Aussie hamburger. It had meat and bacon. Tick. And caramelised onions and orange cheese and a weird bun. Not quite an Aussie burger. The other meal was some sort of special local dish which we would call shepards pie?

There are two sides to see the Falls. The Brazilian side or the Argentinian side. It’s a rivalry thing. I think the best side was the… You can wait. I will say after I write the blog about them. I did the Brazilian side one afternoon. And then next day I rode across the border into Argentina and did that side. Crossing the borders around here is pretty straight forward but as a foreigner with a motorbike I had to be a bit more careful and make sure I did it the right way. Its generally pretty quick and easy if you live in the area.

As luck would have it, I got a message from a mate from Australia that I worked with in Antarctica. He is exactly the same age as me but I think I was born a couple of hours earlier. He was going to be in Argentina and at the falls the same time as me. Our timing was out, but we did finally manage to meet up at the falls on the Argentinian side.

My plan was to go from Brazil into Paraguay, across the friendship bridge, but when he said he was going to be in Argentina, I went back there and booked into a hotel for the night with an interesting cistern and a plan of crossing back into Brazil next morning after we’d had breakfast. I told them at the border I was just going to the Falls and so I didn’t check my motorbike out of Brazil. That night I went out for a nice dinner overlooking the three countries. The new unfinished bridge in the background connecting Paraguay on the left with Brazil on the right and Argentina in the foreground below the restaurant. I was speaking to the waiter who spoke good English and he told me that I should leave Argentina very early in the morning because it was Black Friday and everyone goes to Ciudad del Este in Paraguay to get all the bargains. And it was also a public holiday in Brazil. That didn’t fit my plans.

But he also told me about a small car ferry that crosses each day from Argentina over to Paraguay. I did some research on that and it seemed perfect for me. The only problem was that I had not checked out of Brazil. I thought that it won’t matter as I have a stamp saying that I had checked into Argentina so I had obviously left Brazil. But that night a post popped up on one of my motorbike groups about a couple who had left Brazil without checking out their bike. They were heading back into Brazil and then immigration held their passports as they were flagged for not checking out months earlier and they had to pay a $2500 fine to get their passports back. Then other people had similar stories, although, some able to talk their way out of it.

So, I’m going back into Brazil in a couple of months and didn’t want the hassle. I got up early and was at the border before six and the queue of cars was already a kilometre long. I followed a local motorbike to near the front of the queue and nobody really said anything, so I was able to check my passport out of Argentina and head over the bridge to Brazil. They are pretty switched on over there and there was hardly any queuing. I wandered around trying to find someone who spoke English and could help me with my form. I finally did. He said it was simple, but then he ended up having multiple discussions with his colleagues about a piece of paper stuck on a wall and something that was on the computer screen, back and forth back and forth.

Eventually there was an agreement between them and he gave me a signed and stamped piece of paper saying my bike was now officially stamped out. And then he asked where the bike actually was. I pointed to it over in the carpark. Enjoy the rest of your trip. It was then a 5 minute trip back across the bridge to the Argentinian side where there was now a big queue. It took me until 8:00am to get through that. And I had to tell a porky and say I was only going to the falls and was returning that afternoon. Telling them about the ferry would have just complicated things. I hope that doesn’t come back to bite me.

Anyway by this time my mate was on his way to the falls. I went back to the hotel and packed up my gear and checked out. I rode out to the Falls and we managed to catch up with each other. It was great. I then rode back into town and to the immigration point at the small ferry. I had checked it all out the afternoon before and so it went smoothly. I only had to check me out as I hadn’t actually checked the bike into Argentina. Sort of working within the grey areas of the law.

It was only a couple of dollars for the ferry. There were a couple of other bikes so we chatted as we waited for the ferry to fill before it crossed the river into Paraguay. We got off the ferry quickly with the bikes and I followed the locals to immigration which only took five minutes and then a few blocks away I went to the Aduana, where I was the only person and where the guy spoke enough English to be handy and he logged my bike in for 90 days to match my passport stamp. He seemed in a bit of a hurry and then as he was finishing, lunch turned up and he shook my hand and wished me a good trip and then scurried off to have lunch with his colleagues.

It smelled great and reminded me I hadn’t eaten anything since I got up. I then tried following the map to get to the main road to Asuncion which is the capital of Paraguay but there were lots of diversions around the new roads leading onto the new bridge but I eventually ended up back on track. I then popped up to a lookout to get the classic shot of the meeting of three countries which was kinda cool. The river looks bigger if you look at the minivan on the boat ramp. I had to skirt through Ciudad del Este where I found an ATM and got out some guaraní  [ɡwaɾaˈni] which is the local currency and then not long after I found some stalls cooking meat over coals on the side of the road. It came with yucca and was delicious and I was hungry. No plate. Just the saucepan lid and no cutlery and about 3 dollars including a coke. Yum. It was then a few hours ride on a supposedly good road to the capital. All I had to do was learn the local motorbike rules and I would be fine.