Scot Walker--Memories Of Iguazu Falls

Memories Of Iguazu Falls

From my Diaries, December 1989

Scot Walker

Photo by Ricardo Freitas at Wikimedia Commons.

The excursion to Iguazu Falls will be the first of my 3 scheduled tours of Argentina before I continue to Chile and then to Rio—my favorite city. In Argentina I’ll visit Iguazu Falls in the steaming hot jungle on the border of Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina then fly back to Buenos Aires before heading down to the tip of South America at Ushuaia with a stop at penguin land in Trelew as I fly back to B.A. before flying off to Bariloche where I’d take the lake crossing to Chile.

The temperature at Iguazu will be over 110 but the falls themselves will be magnificent and my only concern is packing—so I’ll take my lightest things to the jungle and when I return to Buenos Aires, I’ll re-pack for Ushuaia with a stop at Trelew to see the hundreds of thousands of penguins, then it’s back to B.A. and repacking for the rest of my journey. It’s a good thing I travel light!

Here’s what I copied from the encyclopedia: “Iguazu Falls are made up of 275 separate waterfalls or cataracts. They stretch over a mile and a half wide with heights of 230 to 260 feet each. One of the most famous features is the Devil’s Throat (Garganta do Diabo), a long, narrow chasm where about half of the river’s flow plunges over a series of steps, creating a permanent mist.”
I can almost feel myself lingering at those mighty falls, as I long for the tepid muggy heat of the jungle and leave DC’s harsh winters. My joy is that these magnificent waterfalls are on the border of Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil and by the end of this adventure I shall see them from all 3 nations even though I’d been warned that crossing into Paraguay is dangerous because head-hunters frequent the forests, but I fear not, I live in Washington, DC where there have already been nine murders on my residential block in the ten years I’ve lived here.

December 5. Silvio, my guide, met me at the airport and drove me to the hotel at the Argentinian side of the falls. Later, I took two walks to the Inferior Falls, then I rested for an hour because the temperature was over 120 before I then walked on the catwalk to the Superior Falls and it was like walking on water! At dinner, I met Vince, the only other English-speaking person in the hotel and astonished him when I went downstairs and spoke Spanish to a cabby to arrange a tour of the Brazilian and Argentinean sides of the falls for both of us the next morning. Silvio, had quoted $100 per person for this same excursion but Tomas, our cabby agreed to take both Vince and me for a total of $20. That evening I admired the spectacular view of the falls from my balcony until all was dark and I could dream of tomorrow.

December 6. Tomas was prompt and drove us to the Power Plant and dam for the one-and-a-half-hour tour which was ninety minutes too long. We then walked through the exhibits and stood on the dam before watching a film that kept stressing “we did nothing to destroy the ecology.” I left thinking “damn if your dam didn’t.”

Next, we went for a 2 hour walk along the Brazilian side before starting the adventure of my lifetime: walking on a pontoon bridge and stand on top of Devil’s Throat, Diablo Gargantua—where the rushing water drowned out all conversation. It felt as if I was walking into a maelstrom itself, as I stood directly on top of it, hearing the thunder of its roar, smelling the aroma of the mist, witnessing the majesty of its never-ending flood! The temperature was 120 and the humidity felt like 100%, but it didn’t matter! I was euphoric, ecstatic, enraptured as I stood there above the waterfalls! The sound, the breeze of fresh cool water, was nothing but sheer bliss! It was like going over the falls in a barrel.

After recovering and drinking a half gallon of water, I asked Tomas; to take us to the Paraguayan side even though we didn’t have visas and I had heard headhunters lived on that side of the river, I was fearless! Besides what better challenge for an adventurer. So off we went and I was already comparing it to the adventure I had had when several friends and I were detained by the police and threatened with jail when we were caught climbing the Great Pyramid of Giza. I’ll share that when I share my adventures in Cairo. Right now, at this moment, I was invincible and relished the thought of bumping into a few Paraguayan border patrols, even if they were armed to the teeth, brandishing machetes and backed up by a tribe of glaring headhunters…it made my adrenalin flow. I had to see Iguazu from all three vistas!

Fifteen minute later, after a lot of smiles, some intervention by Tomas and a warm handshake filled with U.S. dollars, Vince, Tomas and I crossed into Paraguay. There were a few rules . . . like the one I had obeyed when sneaking close to the well-guarded Russian built Aswan Dam in Egypt. None of us were to take photos and there would be no official commemoration of the trip—no visas or stamps on our passports. So, we crossed over, down a jungle path, around several bends, until we reached one of the most glorious “people free views I had ever (or probably will ever) see again. For a few moments I felt like Stanley after he trekked through the jungles looking for Livingston, and discovering Victoria Falls instead. Was that a letdown or sheer bliss? I wonder what it would have been for me—but in my insatiable greed to do it all and see it all, I probably would have delighted in discovering Victoria before marching off to not only find Livingston but to inform him that I had beaten him to the punch!

I was Lewis. I was Clark. I was Hiram Bingham! I was Pizarro, I was all the conquistadors, all the explorers, all the conquerors who’d ever lived. I was as close to heaven as I would ever be. Then I took dozens of photos in my head—still as vivid as any I’ve ever printed, photos that are etched in my brain with thousands of others, living there.

By the end of our tour, Vince and I had paid our driver-guide, Tomas, 38,000 Pesos (about $12 dollars each) for our share of the day long tour plus tip and I thanked him profusely for one of the best days of my life.

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