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November 25, 2004
Missione Iguazu Falls and Five Star Hotels
We made it! we have lived to tell about our trip through the Jungle of Brazil,Uraguay and Argentina .
Our experience in the jungle was without a doubt a ´must see´ for anyone who ventures this far South. Iguazu Falls is part of a large National Park that has many well maintained trails to explore, jungle rides and boat rides to keep you interested. We took a tour because we were too lazy to figure out that you really don´t need a tour...just a map. Oh well , as part of my continual spanish lessons I followed a tour guide all day that didn´t speak a word of English. I praticed my broken Spanish and with some hand jive got the highlights of the story. There are HUGE waterfalls...amazing sounds of water and beautiful rainbows over the jungle. They have catwalks that take you right up the the edge of the water ...not for the faint at heart.
But it seemed that almost everytime I turned around I was in someone´s camera path for a picture. What does everyone do with all those photos of water?
The Hotel scene in Cataratas hasn´t caught up to the new loads of tourists who want to visit. We had trouble booking a reservation in advance. We lasted five minutes in our first ´three star´ Hotel that was booked for us through a travel agent in Buenos Aires.
We went directly across the street to Hotel Cataratas,billing itself as a´five star´ hotel. It was totally booked with French,Chinese and Brazilian tour groups to full capacity, but somehow, my husband convinced them to take us. There I was a long way from home, sitting around the blue pool listening to Madonna and Michael Jackson. However, Five Stars does not mean First Class. The food was not up to any of the fine dining standards I know of....so I won´t comment any further. Our room was large and clean but didn´t have the nice sheets or good towels or come with the services expected in a five star resort class. Internet access at the hotel was slow to poor and always busy. There was a constant movement of people coming and going from all over the World, so the attention to detail wasn´t really needed. I think we were the only Americans. All those little things one would expect from that five star rating. But we roughed it and got by. I think it actually grew on us over the three day stay. The grounds were beautiful with tropical flowers and large 8 foot gardenia bushes everywhere in bloom.
Early on we found one of the best restaurants in town called Los Quinchos. It has a fantastic menu of different salads and meats and an excellent wine list. All very reasonable on any budget. All the meats are cooked outside over wood and very tender and flavorful. the salads come with XV Olive Oil and balsamic vinegar made in Mendoza. The waiters wear black suits and there is live entertainment. Very charming.
After three days here you´ve seen it all. There is a mine where they pull semi-precious stones out of the ground, a preservation park telling the story of the unfortunate ecological damage to the jungle, and an excursion to the Jesuit ruins. The movie THE MISSION was filmed here.
After 4 days we hopped a plane and came back to the exciting life we love in Buenos Aires. We are trying another five star hotel in our new favorite city and will report on their five stars next time.
Posted by sandra at November 25, 2004 02:41 PM