Saturday, March 7, 2015

Greetings from South America

So this will be a fast post because we are awaiting our transport to Iguazu Falls. Our trip has been fabulous. We left from Salt Lake on American Airlines to Dallas to Miami. AA is a horrible airline. We didn´t even get pretzels, not that I need horrible packets of peanuts and pretzels to declare an airline good. At 11pm in Miami, a major international section of the airport that was packed with travelers, the entire airport closed. There was one tiny coffee kiosk opened, that´s it. I couldn´t even purchase a toothbrush or magazine. Nonetheless we arrived in Buenos Aires on time, grabbed a taxi, and made it to my friend Stephanié´s apartment. I had not seen her for 19 years and it was like no time had passed. We took showers, went to lunch and it was amazing, walked around the neighborhood, and then sat on her deck talking until we were tired and needed to go to sleep. Day 2 we went to the Brazilian embassy, applied for our Visas, and found an exchenage place for money. It is really weird, major banks to exchange money, not even HSBC. We finally got directions in extremely broken English to walk two blocks up, two more blocks to the right, and look for a man on the street corner wearing a suit and no hair on his head. We did, we found a different kind of man, and he took us to a small area where we exchanged dollars for pesos at a far more favorable rate than the öfficial 8.5 pesos to the dollar. We got 13 pesos. How this is legal escapes me but it was interesting. We then got on a Hop On Hop Off bus and explored a cemetary where Evita Peron is buried, visited churches, museums, and walked almost 12 miles. We had an amazing dinner of tapas. Day 3 we went to Guacho Country, rode horses, and ate lunch. We sat around the most interesting, well traveled people. I always feel so boring compared to some of these people I meet on my travels. The British couple next to us were wrapping up a 2 month tour of Asia and South America. An American young couple next to us were spending two weeks in South America, going home for a few weeks, then going to Russia, Ukraine and China when they got back. Day 4 we flew from Buenos Aires to Iguazu, Argentina. We arrived early out our beautiful hotel in Iguazu, a beautiful tiny town just miles from the Falls entrance. We slept at the pool, then took a taxi to Paraguay, where we experienced horrific traffic that I haven´t seen since hanging out at the Tijuana border crossing. Ciudad del Este, Paraguay is a sprawling, filthy city but the experience was amazing. Today we are heading to the Arentinian side of the Falls. Stay tuned! I must run but will post photos later. Vacations are an amazing respite from life. I highly recommend them. Hard to believe that once we get home, just a few weeks later and we are heading out to Central America. Life is about living, life is now. Why not? Cheers, dearest readers, Lizzy

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