Wet and Wild

And so to the Itaipu Binational Dam. I had heard a lot of facts about this, and learnt even more which I am happy to regurgitate for you here to save you having to look it up. The dam, shared by Brazil and Paraguay, contains enough steel to build 380 Eiffel Towers, a reservoir that is 120km long, and twenty turbines- ten owned by each country. The Paraguayans generate 90% of their country´s entire energy requirements using two turbines and sell the rest to Brazil- the resulting output of 18 turbines generates around 20% of Brazil´s energy requirements. Quite a disparity in the number of lightbulbs each country uses there. The dam cost US$20 billion and about 150 people died building it. And they keep fish out of the turbines using nets (I asked). The dam also destroyed a number of indigenous settlements and drowned a set of waterfalls called Siete Quedas which were apparently as impressive as Iguazu. I was quite impressed with the dam itself, so this latter fact didnt really hit home, and I was pretty well convinced by the statistics and the lovely renewable hydroelectrics after a short propaganda film. They built a zoo, you see, and give money to charity to make up for uprooting parrots and families, and they did have a lovely airconditioned complex and showed you round for free. My loyalty to environmental issues is easily bought off, it seems.

That is until we reached Iguazu itself a few days later. I had seen plenty of photos before but it really was astoundingly beautiful. Fortunately we arrived early and there were comparitively few people around, so we got some gorgeous views of the rivers thundering over the falls and the mist rising above the trees. Iguazu National Park (Argentine side) is very well done, with a dinky little train to convey you around the different waterfalls and some lovely walkways to get you right up close. They are awfully good at these walkways in Argentina- they had them at Perito Moreno as well- and have managed to blend them into the landscape so that they dont intrude on your pictures, even when they are coverd with fat-bottomed Americans determined to stretch Lycra to the very limits of its capacity and beyond. We wandered around in a sort of awestruck silence for quite a long time, examining the falls from all different angles including right up close into the spray. The park is full of butterflies that land on you (to eat your sweat, romantically. We learnt that in the jungle where the butterflies went crazy for my socks.) There are also all sorts of lizards that pose for photographs and startle you when you walk round a corner.

We shared lunch unwillingly with a coati. This is a sort of poodle-sized raccoon type thingy that hangs around the bins and eating areas. There are big signs telling you not to feed them, and also that they will bite you and steal your food, but Chris didnt believe this negative press and was therefore the only person who was surprised when a coati jumped on the table and made off with our baguette. He (the coati, not Chris) proceeded to retire under a bush within plain view of the two of us, mockingly unwrapped the clingfilm and polished it off. Another big sign nearby said that salami sandwiches would probably kill coatis, but as with most public health and dietary advice in the world these days, the coati chose to ignore it. I hope that sandwich goes straight to its hips.

As if all this Edenic splendour were not enough- a speed boat ride right under the Falls! We had been warned by previous visitors that you got a bit wet, although this turned out to be a slight understatement. It turns out that there is an awful lot of water coming over those waterfalls so when we got within twenty feet the soaking was total. Being such a hot day it was actually quite refreshing although having soaked our pants too it did dry into some very fetching ´look at my crotch´ type patterns.

And now some tragic news. The dousing in the Rio Iguazu did result in one casualty. It is my sad duty to report that my walking boots, yea verily the same walking boots that climbed Cotopaxi (twice, once with my friend Kya in them), traversed the salt flats of Uyuni, scaled the heights of Machu Picchu and pounded the streets of Buenos Aires, even those same walking boots that reached the end of the world in Ushuaia, finally gave up the ghost. By this I mean that the nauseating aroma of rotting feet that had gassed out dormitories in six countries and driven Chris to the very brink of nasal amputation, was so overwhelmingly enhanced by their dip into the churning waters of Iguazu that even I could not ignore their scent for any longer. Birds were falling out of the sky as I passed beneath them. Flowers withered where my feet passed. Reckoning that the Brazilian border police would assume that they were being subjected to some sort of biological attack if I tried to wear them over the frontier, I decided the time had come. My original idea had been to tie them together and throw them into the Falls, until someone pointed out that this might spark a Missing Persons search. So, in a rather ignominious end, I hid them behind the bins in the hostel. This seemed on reflection to have been a poor parting gift to Argentina, a country that has amused and delighted us for nearly three months, until it occured to me that if they took the boots on a pole and pointed them in the direction of the Falkland Islands, the British could be defeated without a shot being fired. I wonder if this is how Oppenheimer felt.