Seriously though, so many selfies. I have never taken so many selfies in one day before. I will share a portion with you here :)
Starting with Saturday night after we got in to Puerto Iguazu. We found a place to grab some food and then walked to what we thought was our hotel, just 10 minutes from the downtown area. We were glad it was within walking distance. But then quickly learned that we had gone to the wrong Jungle Lodge. They called a taxi for us and we were off to our real hotel, which was a good 10-15 minute drive away from downtown, we definitely would not be walking (One of the downsides of doing the Hotwire Hot Deals--not knowing the location of the hotel beforehand, but the price just couldn't be beat!).
We started to get a little nervous when the taxi driver just kept going and going into the jungle. We both started to look at each other like, "Are we about to die?" We finally hit a point in the trees where hotel signs started popping up and pulled up to our hotel. I somehow didn't take any pictures of the hotel!! (I did take quite a bit of video).
The set up was really cool. There were long pathways to get to each of the different lodges, so you got to walk through the jungle to get to them. In general, the rooms just had a cool jungle feel to them--and there was a Jacuzzi in the room! That was a pleasant surprise. We crashed, excited for our adventure the next day.
Hot dogs for breakfast! My kids would be in heaven.
Honestly, the day did not start out great. We took a taxi from our hotel into town just to realize that Darin had forgotten his wallet that had our debit card in it. We needed to pull out cash for the falls since we had spent more on transportation than we had planned. So we took a taxi back to the hotel and then back into town. When we got to the ATM, we couldn't pull money out. We tried 3 different machines and nothing worked. The taxi driver had mentioned that sometimes people's cards only work at a certain bank, so we walked a little ways to the other ATM location. There was a super long line because only one out of the three machines had money. The machine seemed super difficult to use as people had to keep asking others for help.
When it was finally our turn, it didn't work either! We asked for help from some people behind us but couldn't figure it out. It kept asking for our extraction code. We tried our pin and our account number, but nothing worked. We finally just left, super discouraged and unsure what to do. We walked back to the first ATM machines to try one last time. It didn't work again the first few times, but then Darin decided to flip the card, and it worked! We felt so dumb that we had been putting it in the wrong way the entire time and that we hadn't thought to do that sooner, but the machine didn't say which way to put it in, and every time we did it prompted us to put information in, so it didn't seem like there was a problem other than the fact that we didn't know the extraction code (why didn't it just tell us the card was inserted incorrectly from the start!?)
We were both fuming after this hour and a half debockle but decided to put it behind us and enjoy our day. Which we did.
Here we are taking the 30 minute bus ride from Puerto Iguazu to Iguazu Falls. (J/K, I realized later that I'm wearing a different shirt, haha. This was actually taken on the bus to the terminal in Posadas. I loved taking the bus through the city, just as I did as a missionary).
I thought we took a picture on the bus to Iguazu falls, but maybe we were still trying to calm our nerves after how the morning started. Anyway...we got to the falls and had our money (hallelujah) and got in.
There were coatis all over the place.
There are three main trails to see the falls. The upper falls, lower falls, and the Garganta del Diablo (Devil's throat). We were able to do all of them, but started with the Devil's Throat because we wanted to make sure we would see that one. Here we are about to start the hike out on the long bridge trail out.
It was insanely busy the day we were there. It was a weekend, and apparently a holiday weekend at that. I kept thinking, why was it not this busy when I came on my mission? Probably because both times I went were Mondays (P-day!). We really had to work to push through to get to the edge so that we could see everything. Not really the peaceful nature experience we were hoping for, but amazing nonetheless (and we got more of a peaceful oneness with nature feel on the upper trail so we didn't miss out).
Just trying to get all those amazing falls from every single angle. They are stunning!!
We hiked to the Devil's Throat since the line for the train was SO long. It wasn't as long on the way back so we went ahead and took it. There were coati's everywhere!
The upper falls was really nice. So much more space, and fewer people. We could really take our time and enjoy the views, and the weather! We picked the most perfect day to go to the falls. The weather could not have been better.
Our last stop of the day was the lower falls. This was probably my least favorite of the three. It was just so so crowded with people wanting to get super close to the water. I think I enjoy the more distant view of the waterfalls honestly.
The view while walking down the lower trail path towards some falls. They literally just keep going and going.
Definitely didn't need to spend money on that poncho. I got soaked when I went on my mission so I made sure to have one, but didn't get wet at all.
I can't think back to this day without thinking about a young girl we saw laying on the sidewalk as we walked to the exit of the park. She appeared to be with a Guarani group that was selling some crafts. She was rolling around on the ground, clearly unwell. She was dirty and had no shoes on. I wanted to run to her and help her, but I also felt so helpless. As we walked, two women stopped to talk to her to see if they could help and she didn't respond at all. I haven't been able to get her image out of my mind. Where is she now? Is she okay? Why so much injustice in the world?
While gratitude for my own life and all that I have at home is something I felt continually on this trip, at that moment in the park I felt such a strong witness of God's love--for everyone. I really felt the Savior's love and presence in that moment. I could feel of his love and sacrifice for this young girl whose life seems so SO unfair. I don't know how all the things work out for good, but I really feel like they do and will. It breaks my heart and brings me to tears thinking of that girl, but when I look through these pictures of the wonders of the world that the Savior created for us, I see hope. I see love. I see him reaching out to each one of us in ways that only we, in our own individual life situations, can understand. I see him holding her, carrying her, understanding her, loving her.
People keep asking me how it felt to turn 30. It felt amazing. I feel extremely blessed that I was able to spend my 30th birthday in a country that has impacted my world so much, with someone that has filled my world so much. Seeing friends from my mission was the best birthday present I could have received, and these waterfalls were truly the icing on the cake.
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