Back in Mar del Plata

At The Devil's Throat

Along the long walk to The Devil's Throat

In answer to a recent question, I will quote fro Wikepedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iguazu_Falls):

"Iguazu Falls is located where the Iguazu River tumbles over the edge of the Paraná Plateau, 23 kilometres (14 mi) upriver from the Iguazu's confluence with the Paraná River.^[1] Numerous islands along the 2.7-kilometre (1.7 mi) long edge divide the falls into numerous separate waterfalls and cataracts, varying between 60 metres (200 ft) and 82 metres (269 ft) high. The number of these smaller waterfalls fluctuates from 150 to 300, depending on the water level.^[3] About half of the river's flow falls into a long and narrow chasm called the Devil's Throat (Garganta del Diablo in Spanish or Garganta do Diabo in Portuguese).^[1] The Devil's Throat is U-shaped, 82-meter-high, 150-meter-wide, and 700-meter-long. Placenames have been given also to many other smaller falls, such as San Martin Falls, Bossetti Falls and many others.^[3]"

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Brenda and I got back to Mar del Plata on Saturday as planned. 

Before vacating the room I filled in the hotel feedback survey and ticked “Excellent” for every item but one.  We found the Hotel Tourbillon to be modern, well set out, in a pleasant setting, very well staffed, with great food in their restaurant and very fast internet service.  It is conveniently located on the road between the town and the Iguazu waterfalls with a bus stop in front of the hotel.  The bus fare to the reserve is 10 pesos each way, with an average wait of about 10 minutes.  Brenda and I recommend the hotel to others.

I was leaving the hotel happy with a recent message from Daniel the rigger confirming (after 2 weeks!) that the funds that I had transferred to Zurich had arrived OK, and that I could expect him  at Mar Del Plata to re-rig the boat on 7 May.

The tour bus was delayed two hours clearing customs from the Brazilian side.  (Brenda and I were the only two of the group who stayed on the Argentinian side, even though most of the Iguazu falls are on the Argentinian side.  For Argentinians, duty free shopping seems to be the big attraction of visiting Brazil.)  We boarded the bus at 10.30 AM on Friday morning and stopped for lunch at the San Ignacio ruins where Brenda and I found a little restaurant and had a pleasant meal at a sidewalk table.   Along the way two movies were shown and fortunately for me the second one was an action one in English with Spanish subtitles.  We arrived at Mar del Plata at 1 PM on Saturday, remarkably fresh because the sleeping was quite good.  In spite of the afternoon of rain, Iguazu had been warm enough for shorts and short sleeves.  However, Mar del Plata was chilly, cloudy, and drizzly.  Winter had truly set in.

When we arrived at the marina we were pleased to see that the missing section of jetty had been replaced and we were able to walk all of the way to the boat.  The electric power had been restored and soon I had the fan heater going.  After a lunch of ham and cheese sandwiches that we had purchased on the way and a short nap we headed for the market which I hoped would reopen at about 3.30 PM.  It was still closed when we arrived but had only a 10 minute wait until the 4.30 PM opening.   At the market we we purchased steak, ground meat, chicken, vegetables, and bread.  We also dropped by the liquor store and picked up 6 bottles of different wines – Malbecs, a Syrah, a Cabernet Savignon, and a Cabernet Malbec - to get the 10% discount.  Brenda listed the wines and we will rate them.  The six bottles of the better Argentinean wines cost a total of 130 pesos, or about $4.80 per bottle.

After returning with the shopping I went out to fill the boat's water tanks.  We had swapped tanks just before the unannounced jetty work and I figured that we had about one half tank of water remaining, enough for 2 or 3 days.  Unfortunately the jetty had no water service.  The man at the office told me that there was a gap of about 2 ft in the water hose and we could expect a fix sometime in the coming week.  I thanked him with a pleasant smile and walked back to the boat wondering why it would take days to organize a short section of hose, two plastic joiners, and a few clamps to do the fix.