Nightmare in Paraguay
I saw an Advertisement in Puerto Iguazu a few days before: “Visit three countries in one day”. I immediately started to play with this Idea, but since the offer didn't include Itaipu I decided to do it on my own, and a bit later I also thought that since I'm in Paraguay, why not visit the Capital as well? It was a huge mistake but a good adventure.
It is pretty easy to get to the border of Brazil and Paraguay. You can take a bus (moovit app), taxi or Uber. I wanted to do a PCR test, but everyone said at the Hostel that I don't need it it.
Well I did need it… It is true that people can just walk through the border without any checking, but it only works if you are staying for one day. I had to go back to Brazil to do a test. Fortunately, a quick test was enough and on the second try, with the negative result in my hand, I went through the immigration process successfully, however I already lost four hours.
Of course when you are in a hurry, you'll make mistakes. So did I. I know very well, that I never should take the very first Taxi after a border, especially when it isn't signed and doesn't have a taximeter and I wasn't planning to, but I end up taking it anyway. I just wanted to ask if they take Argentinian pesos. He said no, but there was a guy right next to him who changed Pesos to Guaranis. S I asked him the rate. Even though I checked it last night I had no Idea if it was good or not, so I changed 4000 ARS to 100000 Guarani. It should have been 130000 in a normal place. And then I asked the Taxi driver how much the ride would be to the Terminal and at that point I was too confused to know, if 50000 guarani is too much, and if it is, is it because I changed on a bad rate or because he is a scam. Anyway I got a ten minutes ride for like 10 €. Good business it was. And still far from the “best” on my Paraguay trip.
Maybe it is because of the bad experiences but I didn't like Asunción. I remember dirty roads, ugly buildings, poor people living in the parks in tents, however I have to add that I spent only two days there. It is not enough to discover a city with 3 million inhabitants. For example I didn't go to the fancy new neighbourhoods where skyscrapers were built.
Leaving Paraguay, being scammed again This was my worst experience I have ever had during any of my travels, and I lost my wallet once with 400 € cash.
Two weeks before I arrived, the international buses were shut down, because of the new rise in covid cases. I did not know that and could not believe it, so I asked almost every bus company at the terminal if they had any tickets to Argentina. And finally I found one… who lied to me. I also didn't think that there would be a cheaper way than a direct bus ride to Argentina so I paid the price even though I found it too expensive. I only learned later that there isn't any direct bus. They just sold me a ticket from Clorinda, the first Argentinian city, for the fifth of the normal price and they organised the way to the border for us on their own. We got to the border without any problem, but our misery wasn't over. I understood that there would be a car waiting for us on the other side but we didn't find any. Other people who were locals, obviously better in spanish than me, said that there won't be a transfer from this side, however it isn't explain why we run into the arms of the worst scammer of all time. We paid 6000 Pesos for this ten minutes ride which is around ten times as much as it should be and 6 people (4 adults and two children) were stuffed in a small 30 years old car. I almost felt like a victim of human trafficking.
Even though it didn't matter anymore I still couldn't let the thing go so I was trying to find better solutions, and there are and I wrote a separate post about it. I hope it will be useful even though during Covid things change really fast.
Click for more pictures of Paraguay
And some more of the landscape of Farmosa Province, Argentina
Sandor Tokesi, Jujuy, Argentina, 25.01.2022
