The day after visiting the Iguazu Park in Argentina, I booked another taxi to go to the Brazil Park and had the same driver, Nelson.  He didn't really speak English and my Spanish is still pretty terrible, but we managed to engage in some simple Spanish conversations.  Crossing the border was surprisingly quick on the way over and my Brazil Work Visa came in handy (thank you H.J. Heinz Company).  It was a little more congested on the way back but I got in the immigration line just before it got really bad.

​You only need a half-day at the Brazil Park, and if you are ever in Iguazu Falls and only have one day, the Argentina side is much better in my opinion as you can get closer to the falls and it doesn't feel as congested on the trails. 

The one advantage of the Brazil Park is that you get a more panoramic view of most/all of the Falls, albeit from farther away.

​And half of your half-day will be spent waiting in line for the buses, which take you from the entrance to the 1.5 km walking trail to view the falls.  It was extremely crowded, and it took one hour from the time I bought my ticket to actually get off the bus and onto the trail.....it was quicker on the way back out of the Park as I only waited 20 minutes to get the bus.  

​After the Park, I went back to the hostel for a few hours, waited out the biggest rainstorm that I had seen in quite some time,  and then took another taxi to the small city center for a steak dinner.

​Here are the pics:

I booked a taxi from the hostel to visit the Falls from the Argentina side.  I was out of pesos so I had the hostel run a tab for me until I found an ATM at the park (the one at the airport wasn't working the night before).  You pay for a round trip and tell the taxi driver when to pick you up, so I spent the entire day in the Park.  You do need five or six hours to walk all of the trails there without being rushed.

​I waited in line for about 20 minutes outside of the park, where there was one ATM machine, and when I was next in line to go to the machine, it shut down.  I was told that there was an ATM inside the park, so the ticket attendant just let me go in and fortunately, this machine worked, so I came back out, waited in line again for my ticket, and then went back in.

​The park itself was fantastic and they had a series of different trails to walk.  I was there all day and still didn't get to all of the points as there was a huge downpour of rain mid-afternoon...but here are some of the pics.

I had a flight booked on January 3rd from Buenos Aires to Iguazu, Argentina with LATAM airlines.  It was from the domestic airport, which was only 5 km from my hotel and the flight was scheduled for 11:15 am.  I checked in and waited in line at the gate, and then found out that workers went on strike and the flight was cancelled.  The airline said that I could get another flight in two days, though I later found out that people were able to get flights earlier  So, I bought a ticket at the airport with Aerolineas Argentina which was twice as expensive as my original one, and left at 7:25 pm.  After four calls to Orbitz over the next three days, they said I should get my money back for the LATAM flight - in eight weeks.  I sent an email to LATAM about compensation for the additional expense on another airline and I'm certain that I'll never hear from them.

​I had a private room at the Tango Inn Club Luxury Party Hostel, which was along the main highway, but you had to take a bus or taxi to get to the parks or into town.  It had a big swimming pool, with music blasting outside all of the time, and they sold one liter bottles of beer at the front desk, which I guess is what qualifies them as a party hostel.

Trying to get a good signal to catch up on the posts from Iguazu Airport.

​The second tour I took in BA was a city tour, and it probably isn't worth even writing about.  We saw the law school building, a metal flower sculpture, drove through various neighborhoods and had a half hour to walk around...fairly dissappointing.

​The next day I did find some good empanadas on a recommendation from a Habitat For Humanity Friend.

My flight from Frankfurt was about 13 and a half hours, but it was overnight so I slept more than eight hours of it.  It was already 80 degrees when I got to the hotel about 9:30 am.  The hotel let me check early, and I spent the first day walking around Buenos Aires.  My hotel is in the Recoleta area, and there a lot of restaurants within walking distance.

​Yesterday, I took a tour to the Tigre Delta and San Isidro, which included a boat ride through the delta.

​After the tour I booked my flight and hostel for Iguazu Falls. I am staying on the Argentinian side, but should also be able to visit the Brazilian side since I got a Brazilian work visa when I was at Heinz that's valid until 2021. 

I'm also trying to figure out how I'm going to get from Punta Arenas back to Ushuaia after my Antarctica trip.  There is a bus that runs on Sundays, which is when I need to travel, but when I called the bus company and tried to communicate in Spanish, it either sounded like there weren't any spots left or they didn't take reservations.

​Apart from the hotel and tour guides, there's not really a lot of people that speak English so I'm trying to remember things from my Spanish lessons.

​New Year's Eve was pretty quiet where I am staying so I was back at the hotel by 9pm and read a book...

​Today I'm taking a three-hour city tour in the afternoon.

​The food is pretty good, but I am still looking for some empanadas to try.

Lisbon is a fantastic city.  The drive from the airport to my hotel was quick and inexpensive via taxi.  I scored a great deal on Hotels.com and am staying at the Marques de Pombal, which is right on Avenida da Liberdade and within walking distance to the Bairro Alto (older part of the city) and the riverfront where there are tons of restaurants, cafes and stores.  The hotel looks like it was recently upgraded and has a great breakfast buffet included - and really good wifi.

Given that I'm tired of tours and sightseeing right now, I didn't really do much but walk around and stop in some places.  I finished a book that I started in Morocco, shopped for some winter clothes for Antarctica (every store had after Christmas sales going on), researched/booked things for Argentina and Uruguay, and tried some of the local food and wine.  I had some good salmon yesterday, and a popular Portuguese dish, codfish with potatoes, today.

​It was a nice change from Morocco in that people weren't as pushy to sell things, other than a few entrepreneurs that approached me trying to sell hashish and sunglasses.

​Tomorrow I'm headed to Buenos Aires via Frankfurt.  I called Star Alliance to make sure that I'm actually booked on this flight and won't have to buy another unneeded ticket...

Most of yesterday was spent traveling.  I took the 8:45am train from Marrakech to the center of Casablanca, and then a taxi to the airport.  There was some major confusion with my booking on TAP airlines and I wasn't able to call Luftansa, so I ended up paying for a one-way ticket in cash and called Luftansa when I got to Lisbon.  Hopefully I get reimbursed for this as it was some screw-up between the two airlines.  I'm trying to catch up on a few things today at the hotel and then will take a walk toward the river. 

I decided to cancel a tour I had booked for Christmas Day as the other Moroccan tours were kind of dissapointing, and just stayed around town, talked to my family, and then had dinner back at the Riad (tagine of beef).

The Riad booked a day trip to Essaouira for Christmas Eve.  It's about 3 hours west of Marrakech by tour bus and is on the Atlantic coast.  I met a Norwegian family and an American guy that was on vacation alone, so he and I had lunch in Essaouira.  On the way there the driver pulled over so we could take a picture of goats standing in a tree.  Esaouira also has a Medina, and is much more laid back than Marrakech.  It also has a nice beach area.

I met a guy on the train who gave me the number of his cousin, who (supposedly) teaches at an American University and also gives tours.  He picked me up in the morning at the edge of the Jamaa el Fna (square in the Medina) and was expecting a full day tour as I got a quote for about $30.  He drove me around the city for a little while and then took me to the Jewish quarter where there was a synogue, and a cooperative that sold carpets. Once I explained that I wasn't going to buy anything, he said 'it doesn't look like you want to buy anything so I won't charge you and you can just walk around the Medina on your own'.  Very odd.  That tour lasted about 45 minutes, but at least it was free...
​

​After I was left on my own to walk around, I went to the Bahia Palace.  Marrakech had just hosted a global Climate Conference, so they had some exhibits on that in the Palace.  I had lunch at a local place and then dinner in the Medina again.