Well today's plan was to visit the Parque des Aves, the bird park, followed by the Brazilian side of the Iguacu falls but as with all plans....
On the way to the park I chatted to a couple from London who had been travelling South America for the last six months and they confirmed my thoughts on Paraguay that it's actually a beautiful place but with a tiny population and a developing economy remains cut off from today, which made it sound like somewhere untouched by modern levels of tourism and a fascinating place to visit.
The bird park turned out to be brilliant use of 4 hours of our time with lots of South American birds
from cranes and flamingos to toucnas, macaws and harpy eagles. Enclosures were a good size, not up to wild standards but many of the birds had been rescued and appeared well looked after. With how close the birds were, particularly the macaws and Amazonian parrots
whose enclosure we walked through and collected some bright feathers (from the floor, not the birds!) and the toucans
who were totally disinterested in us more interested in food
the experience was truly worthwhile. There was even an enclosed area with hummingbirds flitting around, turned out they are pretty tough to get pictures of.
Unfortunately the tropical forest we walked through demonstrated just why tropical forests are so green and we started to get pretty wet and abandoned for the day as far too wet to see any falls.
That meant that Roger, Alex & I spent the afternoon in McDonald's drinking coffee (and reeling from how expensive it was, approx 50% higher than home in a place where salaries are a lot less) and playing cards followed by dinner in a petrol station forecourt complete with beggars of human and animal varieties, certainly an experience and but for the smell of petrol an enjoyable one.