August is (almost) over so high time for our July blog 🙂 On July the first we left Uruguay and crossed into Argentina again. For the last time though, since we were on our way to Paraguay. At the Argentinian border they did look a little suspicious at our passports and it took them a while to give them back. Maybe because by now we were entering Argentina for the 7th(?) time and had already stayed longer than the 180 days that are officially allowed? They asked us where we were going and when we answered Paraguay, they gave us our passports back. When we checked the passports, they had given us another 90 days, the normal amount. They could have given us only enough time to transfer, but Argentina is a laid back country, even at the border! We spend three nights at Lago Salto Grande near Concordia, relaxing. Kilian went on a bike ride here, we did some grilling and Finnley got to run around off leash.
And then on the 6th of July we left Argentina behind us for the last time. I kind of miss this beautiful country. It’s got really beautiful, diverse nature, lots of space to roam and to wild camp. Delicious food and super friendly people. Mendoza is one of the best cities we have ever visited. Really the only thing we don’t like is the climate in most parts. It can get quite cold, even in the north, and this country is so incredible windy! But all good things come to an end (why?) and we drove in to Paraguay. Paraguay is one of the smallest countries in South America and it’s landlocked just like Bolivia. The capital is Asunción and this is situated near the border with Argentina, so that’s where we went first. We only stayed 17 days in this country and we didn’t do that much. But that’s not because there isn’t that much to do. We were tired after four border crossings in three weeks, the van needed maintenance and Finnley needed another vet appointment and for the first week the weather sucked. Paraguay is considered a middle income country in South America, but we saw quite the divide between rich and poor. Asunción isn’t the most beautiful or safest city. Lots of buildings are beyond repair, roads suck and there are lots of homeless people. But you also have beautiful neighbourhoods with luxury restaurants, shops and supermarkets. In one of those supermarkets we managed to buy apple sauce (appelmoes) and sweet liquorice (drop)! We guess it’s because of the German immigrants. We explored the city a bit, we saw the palacio Lopez, the national pantheon of heroes and stumbled upon a cat rescue.
While staying near the Bahia, but lower on the beach, a young woman with photography as an hobby approached us and asked if she could take some photo’s of Finnley and us. The beautiful photo on top of this page was taken by her (Pazcabariph on IG).
I managed to find a vet that specialises in cats. After our negative experience in June in La Colonia, I now went in alone first. But the vet was friendly, professional, trustworthy and spoke English. So we made an appointment for Finnley to be castrated, x-rayed and some blood work. Good news; his blood was now fine and there was nothing to see on the x-rays. So the abnormal blood values he had in May were a result of the malnutrition. Him not jumping that well, could also be caused by that. His leg muscles could be a bit underdeveloped and he probably was too sick to practise jumping as a kitten and therefore he doesn’t feel comfortable doing it now.
We also spend several days on camping Pequena Bavaria, an hours drive from Asunción. This camping was founded by a German couple and their three kids. They had never been to Paraguay and didn’t speak any Spanish. They were looking to leave Germany and made a list of countries that met their requirements and then just packed up and left to go live in a country they had never been to! Well if that’s not a relaxed and gutsy attitude, I don’t know what is! I celebrated my birthday here, and for the first time in my life it was actually cold! Even for winter in Paraguay, it was only 12C. Well that was a new experience, but not one that I necessarily want to repeat. We both really dislike the cold. Finnley made some friends here with the families cats. He got especially friendly with Aragon, a beautiful Maine Coon of only 10 months old, but nearly twice Finnley’s size. I felt bad about making Finnley leave his friend behind, but such is the life of a travelling cat.
We also visited Aregua near Asuncion, a colonial town that now thrives on tourism because of the strawberry fields and pottery. Not sure how this combination came to be!
After Pequena Bavaria we crossed in to Brazil on the 22nd of July near Pedro Juan Caballero. A town that is divided by the border. And as such you can drive out of Paraguay and into Brazil without going to immigration or anything. As a matter of fact, the immigration police is 4 km’s away on the other side of town and there are no checks whatsoever. This felt a bit strange to us. And up until now, five weeks later, we haven’t had a single police check or anything. So if you want to stay in Brazil illegally, it is easy. Of course we didn’t and got all the right paperwork. From the border we went on our way to Corumba. On our way to Corumba we spend one night in a park at a lake in the town Aguidauana. Here in the middle of town there were crocs (or cayman, we can’t tell the difference) in the lake, blue parrots in the trees and capybara’s on the ground. Such an abundant wildlife! But Brazil definitely isn’t the green haven you might expect, especially not in the South. We had lots of days before us, driving through nothing but mostly empty agricultural fields. Nothing but brown and yellow and dust. And fires. Winter is the dry season, some fires occur naturally, but the farmers also burn down the fields. More than once the side of the road was on fire, but that’s all normal here. Twenty meters away people are just casually sitting next to their house.
We reached Corumba on the 26th of July without any issues, except for some smoke and dust inhalation 🙂 Here our Pantanal adventure would begin. And this was quite the adventure and we have soooo many photo’s and video’s that I will write about this in a separate blog.
