After my successful exploits in the Ibera wetlands, it was time to head north to the famous falls of Iguazu. In Iguazu, my goals were twofold. One to see one of the most majestic waterfalls in the world, and two to visit Brazil (if only for a day) so my visa would be validated for its full 5 year term. I only had about 30 more days to visit before it expired from disuse.

Puerto Iguazu is the northernmost city in Argentina (at least on the eastern side) and is located at the corners of Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina. The town itself was really unattractive and surprisingly downtrodden, especially considering one of the premier tourist attractions in South America is only 18 kilometers away. I yet again took an overnight bus and arrived at about 7:00. As a result, I was able to get into the falls relatively early (about 10:00), which set me up nicely for the stifiling, moist heat of the subtropical rain forests.

I'd like to rave about the falls and the area around them, and they were certainly beautiful, but the park set up to handle the thousands of visitors was the same as any generic, high-volume park is. It felt very much like Disneyworld at the falls. Luckily the prices weren't nearly as outrageous. The falls themselves were magnificent, covering a tremendous width and height.


The Argentinian side of the falls is set up as a series of hikes through the forest to capture close views of the numerous individual falls which comprise the entire width. The Brazilian side offers better views of the falls as a whole.

Most people I overheard were comparing Iguazu with Niagra, and saying Niagra couldn't compete. Certainly in beauty of the site itself, I'd have to agree, though a bird's eye view of Niagra's horseshoe is stunning. The main reason for me was the setting of Iguazu in the lush forested surrounding.

Everything was green, and despite the cobblestone paths and concrete viewing platforms, it was impossible to shake the feeling that you were stepping into a scene from "The Blue Lagoon", or looking down on an undiscovered swath of Amazonian rainforest.

While it had the feel of a somewhat fake foray into the wild, the limited access had certainly done a splendid job of preserving the site. It was a day well spent.

At the hostel I found in Puerto Iguazu, I met a chap from France who had a tale of being stabbed during a mugging in Chile. I found this discouraging, as Chile is supposed to be the safest country in South America. Based on this information, I decided to develop a method to help me avoid a similar fate, no matter what country. In the future, I will avoid French travellers.

In the same hostel, I met a handful of Argentinians who had the week before Easter off, and were staying in the north. I arranged to hitch a ride with three of them the following day into Brazil. While it certainly wasn't my first mistake, it could have been one my largest to date but for a twist or two of fate.

My amigos and I set off the following morning, and made it through the border with no troubles (visa is officially valid). Upon crossing, my travelmates made it clear to me (the language of the day was Spanish, and in case I haven't mentioned it, mine's not so good) that they were in fact headed to Paraguay to buy black market electronics. Since I had no intentions of ever going to Paraguay for any reason, I told them this sounded like a terrific idea. Not really sure why. The crossing between Brazil and Paraguay is absolutely insane. On the Brazilian side, Foz du Iguacu is a lovely town (much nicer than Puerto Iguazu), but just across the bridge, Ciudad del Este in Paraguay is maniacal. We decided to park the car and walk across the bridge. While the crossing is frequented by smugglers running by on foot, the hassle of trying to cross by car through rigorous customs checks simply wasn't worth it, especially since the idea was to buy super cheap electronics. Ciudad del Este, because it is a center for many Argentinians to come and buy cheap goods, is a haven for petty theft and pickpocketting. As a result, we were extra careful as folks ran by, bumping into us as they passed. We escaped unscathed.

In Ciudad del Este, Maria purchased a digital camera for US$250 and Pablo bought an assortment of things for about US$50. Since I was unable to figure out where the immigration office was at the border crossing, I was in Paraguay illegally, and therefore a bit hesitant to buy anything, though they did have some bootleg DVD's for US$2. Crossing into a country illegally is much less worrisome than leaving one. Coming in, if you've done something wrong, they just turn you away. Trying to leave, though, they have a tendency to want to hang onto you. As a result, I started to sweat a bit as we walked out of town towards the bridge and the number of armed military and police increased. I made it out ok and even crossed back into Brazil without incident (also worrisome as I didn't have an exit stamp).

We spent the next few hours at the Itaipu dam, the largest dam in the world and one of the seven wonders of the modern world. It was quite impressive, but I lost interest when I learned there were no piranhas. Anybody can build a dam without piranhas.

What followed our trip to Itaipu was a seemingly harmless return to Argentina...or so I thought. Unbeknownst to me at the time, Maria had purchased a camera the value of which exceeded the maximum allowed for re-entry without paying a fee. The "fee" was an additional 50% of the value of the object above the cutoff. In this case, she had a camera which cost $100 more than she could bring in, which meant a fee of $50 to be paid in Argentina. Yowsa! As I say, this was all unknown to me as we piled into the car at the dam for the drive home. My major concern was my exit stamp from Brazil. After cutting line amongst some septegenarians on a guided tour (I think I managed to blend quite well thanks to me beard, they say it adds 50 years), the stamp was no sweat. It was when we reached the Argentinian border that the excitement started to kick in. Customs pulled our car over for a search. They gave my bag a quick once-over, but when they realized the drool-enhanced gaze of ignorance was legitimate, they passed me over as a non-smuggler. Unfortunately, my Argentinian friends were not so lucky.

After a thorough investigation of the packages, a debate ensued. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what was said, but it appeared to be focusing on the camera. My deductive powers are without equal. I began to realize that my Argentinian friends either were in serious threat of being arrested (there were numerous armed military types surrounding the office) or they just loved to argue with a passion. Fearing it might be the former option, I began trying to hitch-hike home, but was re-assured by a wink and a smile from one of the arguers that no danger was present. Around 20 minutes later, everybody emerged, with the camera, and we all piled in the car. No harm no foul. Pablo started up the car and immediately cut across eight lines of traffic to steal a spot in the line headed back to Brazil. I found this to be most unusual behavior and conveyed this impression with a dumbfounded look and mastery of Spanish, allowing me to say the equivalent of "What the...?"

Having survived the Brazilian border once, I was not particularly looking forward to a second coming in the same day. In an area frequented by smugglers, it didn't really seem the smartest idea to have half-a-dozen stamps a day headed in and out of countries. This was not my friends concern at the time, and when we got to the Brazilian border, they pulled the car over and jumped into action. What sort of action, and why, I wasn't sure, but I tried to be helpful by dozing silently in the front seat. After a few minutes, Nicolas got out of the back seat and walked away. Maria gave me the camera to hide in my backpack, and Pablo started the car and drove back towards Argentina, without Nicolas.

It's important to convey at this point the situation I was in. I had just come from an illegal border crossing into a country known for its black market. All my possessions were in the country I was headed towards (but not yet in). I was travelling with friends I had made less than 24 hours ago, and who had no reason to trust or care for me whatsoever. We had just come from a 20 minute argument about a camera at a customs stop in a country where I knew no one and very little of the language. I now had said camera hidden in my once innocent backpack and had no idea what to do if asked about it other than say it was my travel camera (regardless of the fact it had no working battery or memory card). One of the people I was travelling with had jumped ship, and I didn't have the faintest idea why, though I was growing increasingly jealous. These were not the greatest circumstances, in retrospect, but at the time I was still riding the high of being a daring piranha hunter and successful boundary-runner, so what's a little smuggling in such esteemed company?

What is the penalty for smuggling in Argentina, anyway?

Sitting here writing days later, I can now see exactly what my friends were thinking. They'd seen one too many movies. They thought the customs officers would be looking for a car with 4 people and that the camera would be hidden somewhere in that car. I was told to stand off in the distance somewhere, so that when asked where I was, Pablo could claim ignorance (by far the weakest part of their scheme as armed militiamen surrounded the customs area). With this paper-thin plan in Pablo and Maria's minds, away we went, like Custer's ill-fated troops. At least they had guns. All I had was a two-day old salami sandwich and a lukewarm bottle of water.

Somewhat obviously, we were pulled over yet again and searched. This was despite Pablo's flawless execution of the plan to choose a line as far as possible from the office. Our search was considerably more thorough this time around. I'm not a criminal expert, but I suspect that there weren't a lot of Argentinian tourists coming across the border with 6'4" gringos resembling Grizzly Adams. Now, if I had a wig and some Groucho Marx glasses, that would have thrown them. After a search of my bag, they found the camera (those Argentinian customs agents are like bloodhounds). I did my best to help my friends out by tossing it aside and saying "My camera". I'd like to think DeNiro couldn't have done it with more casual indifference. Somehow I suspect that the still wrapped instructions found in Pablo's backpack and the receipt found in Maria's purse might have given some contraditory evidence, despite my best efforts. I'm pretty sure they still tended to believe me, but the weight of evidence was great and I was unable (and not a little unwilling) to argue my case.

Yet another lengthy argument ensued. This one I didn't take quite so lightly as there was considerable pointing in my direction. Drool-enhanced ignorance wasn't going to get me through this one. I decided it was time to pull out the big guns and go for sweat-glistened guilt-ridden criminal. Given the circumstances, it probably wasn't the best choice, but as I was method acting, it was what my current role called for. Luckily, I wasn't dragged away in cuffs, and Pablo headed off to the office for some more arguing with the camera and the lion's share of the artillery trailing behind him, hungry for action. He apparently paid the extra fee (Maria didn't have the money) and came back with the camera in hand. All this was extremely confusing for me. It became a good deal moreso when we got in the car and started driving back to the hostel in Argentina. While this is certainly where I wanted to go after narrowly escaping a certain life in prison, it seemed that we were still missing one of our group. This was all resolved (I thought) when we pulled over a few meters down the road and Pablo got out of the car. It seemed like the plan was for Nicolas to catch a lift back across the border to meet us. How you do this at 10:00 at night, I'm not sure, but it clearly wasn't the best thought out plan in the history of smuggling, so i'll let that pass. Instead of simply stretching his legs while waiting for Nicolas to join us, though, Pablo was headed back to the lion's den to file an official complaint. While he was away, Nicolas pulled up in a taxi said hello, checked on the status of things, gave Maria $50, and drove off. I'm still not sure what happened to him, where he got $50, or why he had to take a taxi. The twists in their intricate plot were too many for me to follow. Everything came out OK for me, though, and I made it back to the hostel and out of Puerto Iguazu without further incident.

So ended my life of crime. At least for now.