The Day of the Butterflies
Foz do Iguaçu
7 december 2000
Wake up at our service station here in Foz do Iguaçu and head out to see the falls. We drive through a touristy area along a strip of land bordering the highway interspersed here and there with the farms that lined the road eleven years ago. There are a few cows grazing in the green pastures behind the 'new' tourist hotels lining the road. There are a few hotels that didn't quite make it into reality -- being only partly constructed and then abandoned.
We enter the park after paying the required fee (I believe $8 US) and drive over the accumulated quebra molas or speed bumps in a green avenue of jungle-like trees hearing birds and maybe the high screech of monkeys along the way. We see signs that say not to run over the wildlife. Valeria read in her book about a trail down to the river near the first guard station so I stopped and asked but found out nothing so we drove on to the pink Hotel das Cataratas overlooking the falls. Since we were some of the first people there, we had no problem with parking. Once in the shade we left the vans and walked the short distance to the trail that led to the Garganta do Diabo or Devil's Throat. Immediately out of the van you could hear the roar of the falls. We walked toward the roar.
The Iguaçu River ('guazu'='big' in Guarani and 'I'='water' in Guarani) starts near Curitiba some 40 miles from the Atlantic Ocean and flows westward several hundred miles across the state receiving some 30 tributaries along the way. It then spreads out just before the falls to a width of 4 km. Then there are rapids for 3.5 km before the river plunges over its 60 meter (200 foot) precipice in 275 separate falls covering a frontage of 2,470 meters or nearly a mile and a half. The rate of the fall is 1,750 cubic meters a second -- lots and lots of water. Now back to the fun stuff.
Just a few steps down the paved trail we could see the first of the hundreds of falls that make up Iguaçu bathed in morning sunlight on the Argentinian side of the Iguaçu River. At this time of the year, the falls are between high water and low water so they were white and powerful pitching up enough spray to make wonderful double rainbows for every picture. We heard a rustle over the side of the trail and when we looked over the barrier, there coming up the paved ditch was a coati mundi sniffing as it went searching for food. We took pictures and watched it as it left the ditch and started rooting somewhat like a pig in the leaves with its long nose for hidden morsels. Then it slowly disappeared into the thick undergrowth up the hill.
Just then I caught a glimpse of something large and gawky flying from one tree to another overhead. Sure enough it was a toucan -- no, two toucans -- red rumps, black bodies, huge yellow and orange bills with a black spot on the end and a big bright blue ring around the eye -- not nature's best camouflage job! Who knows for what purpose all these gaudy colors ended up on this one bird but there it was hopping gracefully along a limb balancing its body with its long beak. Then we thought we saw a different toucan below the other two but they turned out to be baby toucans -- two of them. They were half as big as the parents and had short custard-colored stubby beaks and lacked some of the bright colors but still were a sight to be seen.
Finally still marveling at the sighting of the toucans, we tore ourselves away from the spot and moved toward the roar in front of us. All through the trees, we could see falls on the Argentinian side of the river divided by the huge blocky Isla de San Martin or San Martin Island. We could see some small powerboats moored in the water near the island that take tourists up to the base of some of the larger falls on that side. In 1972 on my second visit to Iguaçu, Lui and I took a rowboat across to the island and walked to the top where, since it was at a time of low water then, we saw filmy strands of waterfall where now there were raging torrents.
As we descended toward the falls, we began to see butterflies of different colors, hues and sizes ranging from the huge iridescent blue morpho to orange ones to yellow ones to black ones. It is said that over 2,000 species inhabit the park area. A most interesting one was black and white and gray and nearly as big as the swallowtail in West Virginia. No more wonderfully camouflaged insect have I ever seen. When it landed, it always landed on lichen covered treebark that looked exactly like it. But what was even more strange was the fact that it also always landed upside down!
I must have hit one on the road sometime back because last week, I found a dying black, white and gray near the base of the gearshift in the Vanagon. I made it comfortable and let it be for a day till it died. Now I have it pressed as a memento of its splendor. Back to Iguaçu -- what splendor we were about to see. On down the path you could begin to see beautiful vistas through the tree branches of the accumulation of falls on the Argentinian side of the river. Down, down, down we went to the left side of the falls and then, on a catwalk out on the flat top of the second level of falls almost to the edge of the Devil's Throat and right to the edge of a falls going over the lower second stage. We got pretty wet at this point from the spray blowing back up toward us from the torrent below. It takes us some minutes to appreciate all the power around us -- thundering falls, tons of water washing around and above us, water rushing literally under our feet and shooting out into space over the ledge 10 feet away.
We saw gigantic spider webs between the tree limbs to catch the hapless moth or butterfly wandering by. Will told me of the National Geographic moment of the day when he saw a blue morpho butterfly stray into a spider web and before his eyes, the spider caught it. Maybe better to be eaten by a spider I suppose than to be caught in a net and killed so your wings could be used inside a plastic plate sold to tourists but the butterfly is still dead both ways.
About now we were beginning to see the day trippers arrive by the busload -- Argentinians, Americans, Germans, Japanese -- tourists from every corner of the world. So it was time for us to climb back up the trail and to get out of Dodge City before any more people arrived. We slowly crept back up the trail resting here and there to look at the butterflies, the coatis who were now working the tourists for handouts and a few misplaced moths who were trying to find a place to wait out the day for their special time, the night. Morning is the best time to see the falls since those on the Argentinian side are bathed in sunlight. Also it is best to go to the Brasilian side first as we did since the view of the Argentinian side is best seen from Brasil.
We get back to the top of the trail and another miracle of mis-organization here in Brasil... they have sprayed tar on the road surface and are spreading asphalt with a road grader and flattening it with a roller... in front of our cars... so with no notification of any kind, we are paved in... too bad someone in public works couldn't have thought that this is indeed one of the prime tourist destinations of the world and that perhaps people might inadvertently park where they had decided to pave today and so thought to have put up a barrier or two or a ribbon or a lean-to sign or at the very least laid down a couple of rocks or at bare minimum a simple green tree branch or two which is a universal symbol here in Latin America that 'something is up' and that one should proceed with caution -- DON'T PARK HERE! But no, here we are 'paved' in! We wait with consternation as no one takes not even the slightest interest in our predicament. When I notice that they are preparing to dump another load of asphalt on the first, I decide that I am going to be a Brasilian and do what needs to be done and to hell with the consequences -- I started Billy up and we left driving across the fresh asphalt.
Vicki had said that she would like to see the bird park which was mentioned in one of our books and that we had seen on the way in so we decided to stop there before we went over to the Argentinian side of the falls. From the outside it looked like just another tourist trap and perhaps it was but we bit the bullet and parted with our 5 reais and went in. There were aviaries of various sizes ranging from cage size to large enclosures yards across and yards high. In some areas, you could walk with the birds. There were flamingoes, various ducks and grassland birds, some toucans and other tree dwellers all loose that flew near us and landed on banisters to stare at us as though we were the oddity to be gawked at. Perhaps they were right!
I was impressed overall by the quantity of birds there and overwhelmed by the toucans who came right up to us. But for the life of me, I can't figure why any bird would have a big blue ring around its eye -- maybe they are the pro-football players of the bird world and instead of wearing black grease paint around their eyes, they have chosen blue to match one of the colors of the Brasilian flag. I suppose I will never know unless someone reads this and writes me and tells me.
Also at the Parque das Aves were many parrots. They had the African grey which had developed its own vocabulary from hearing people pass by and by hearing the other birds around it. There were rose colored parrots and green parrots and yellow parrots and small parrots and big parrots---more than I had ever seen. From the aviaries, a trail through the trees took you to the butterfly, moth and hummingbird house where you were surrounded by them. There were perhaps two dozen species of butterfly and moth and half a dozen hummingbirds. The butterflies were spots of light flashing by in the sun -- more difficult to photograph than one would think since they seldom paused anywhere even though there were several flowers in bloom all around. They also sat out trays of fruits as food for the butterflies. Here was the largest caterpillar in the world... of the eyed moth. The caterpillar was brown and about six inches long placidly munching on leaves behind a glass panel. Outside clinging to the wall was a large moth with a wingspread of 6 inches on whose underside appeared a large eye spot. Quite beautiful!
Finally I had come to the end of the Parque das Aves and went outside where I found more butterflies in an area of flowers planted alongside the administration building so I spent another hour going from flower to flower chasing butterflies to photograph them. One of the main flowers they had planted was the common zinnia which the butterflies certainly liked.
At 2:17pm we crossed the Iguazu River into Argentina just above where Lui and I crossed by ferry some 28 years ago. I remember that day very well. The sun was hot, the ferry was small and only took passengers and was colored blue and white for the Argentinian flag I suppose. Once on the other side, we had to walk up the riverbank and catch a ride to the Brasilian falls several miles away or maybe we walked there. On the way I spotted a lineman wearing one of those flat Italian style caps that people in this region wear working on the power lines. I still have the picture I took of him that day.
We went through Argentinian customs with no hassel since traffic here is usually just motioned through because the majority of the people at this crossing are only going to the other side of the falls. The Argentinian side of the falls is more calm and less glitzy than the Brasilian. It is also less prosperous especially now that the Argentine government has decided to chase after the dollar linking the peso to the dollar making everything in Argentina very expensive. The result of failed economic plans here was immediately evident in the several relics of hotels which had been built but never finished---some of them being 10 stories tall and just abandoned. Now the concrete superstructure had a few bromeliads that had colonized it along with the black lichen that makes everything here look sooty.
We drove on through the building heat into the national park ($5 US) and to the parking lot near the Sheraton Hotel Internacional -- a not so pretty structure built in a modern style (i.e. ugly) with a head-on view of the falls. On the way in, we could see where they seemed to be building a small train track through the woods perhaps to haul loads of cheering tourists from one spot to another. Another thing we noticed immediately in Argentina -- better and simpler road signs rather than the hodge-podge collection in Brasil and also better information in the national park where you could actually get information at the visitor center and where there was a miniature reproduction of Iguazu Falls for all to observe. No such visitor center in Brasil. No brochures either.
The sun was hot and the sky a wonderful blue as we walked out by the observation tower which resembles a light house and continued onto the newly restored catwalks that were under construction even as we walked over them. The ones I first saw in 1970 had washed away but some of the concrete supports were still there. Then they had been rebuilt and had washed away one or two more times the last time being in 1997. This seemed to be about the fourth time for the catwalks. We first walked on the 'superior' catwalks or those at the edge of the falls and then Kai and I went down to the 'inferior' catwalks which are those on the second level of the falls since almost all the falls at Iguazu have two levels, an upper falls and a lower falls -- except the Devil's Throat of course which rushes over the edge in one great swoosh to hit the rocks at the bottom of its canyon 200 feet below.
There were at least a dozen butterflies that we saw that stopped us in our tracks. Some appeared to have eyes on their backs and others were iridescent. They were everywhere. One orange one perched on the pants pocket of one of the men working with a submersible air drill in the water below where we were walking I suppose after the salt deposited on the flap of his pocket. Two or three landed on Will and stayed long enough for me to photograph them. Butterflies always land on Will -- on his hat, his shoulder, his shirt, his arm -- I suppose he must be a sweet man after all -- or is he just an old salt?
When we got back from the catwalks to the tourist kiosk where no one was buying anything, we decided that we would like an ice cream which in Brasil would have cost us a real or the equivalent of 50 cents. The same ice cream here in Argentina was US$2!! So we passed it up. Gasoline here in Argentina is a dollar a liter and there are 3.784 or so liters per gallon so it is $3.78 a gallon and Tierra del Fuego is about 2,000 miles from Buenos Aires. I don't even want to think about it.
Behind the deserted tourist kiosk we heard a rustle in the underbrush and then we saw an extended family of coati mundis taking a leisurely stroll through the forest. The adults probed here and there with their long noses for hidden grubs and such while the babies of which there were many cavorted like young colts or young puppies attacking one another and rolling in tangled masses on the forest floor. Nearby there was a large 'logarto' or lizard colored white and black which I didn't get to photograph since I was occupied with the coatis. They look like baby racoons and acted the same -- irresponsible kids climbing all over everything even to the point of falling out of the trees they were cavorting on.
We decided to drive on to Puerto Canoas where the long catwalk led out to the Argentinian side of the Garganta del Diablo so we headed back that direction. When we got there I was surprised that it too had been washed away and now you had to take a rubber boat to the current end of the catwalk beyond some bent wreckage that marked where it had been before -- even 11 years back. We elected not to go so I decided to walk along the road that went behind the tourist food booths to see if the campground where I stayed 11 years ago was still there. On the way I met a couple she French and he English who told me that yes the campground was there and that there was only one car in it so we drove to the campground -- and it was called after the rhea or Ňandu as it is known in Argentina.
It was as fabulous as before when I was here. A huge campground completely devoid of people. Huge trees shading all the many sites from the fierce sun. Our sites looked out through the trees to the Iguaçu River. One additional surprise was that here there were more butterflies than I had ever seen in one place in my life. They were of every description and numbered in the hundreds. In this day, December 7th, I had seen more butterflies than in my previous 57 years. I spent the next two hours following them around with the camera while Will and Vicki and Valeria worked on supper.
When I was sweeping the dirt and leaves off our picnic table, a wasp came out and stung me on the leg just like those do on the front porch at home in the spring. After taking care of the nest -- they have plenty of other places to build -- we sat down and had a wonderful communal supper of potatoes and sausage by Will, lentil soup by Vicki and boiled potatoes and tomato salad by Valeria washed down with orange wine and beer. Then we sat talking as thousands of moths now replaced the butterflies of the day. Will had his swim trunks hanging on the side mirror to dry and on them I counted at least 100 moths.
With the moon peeking through the trees, we finally closed this very special 'Butterfly Day' and got inside our campers to sleep peacefully without being awakened by the usual roosters and dogs.
The toucan is real and wasn't in a cage and is those
colors. It was on the Brasilian side of Foz do Iguacu
and was with its mate and two babies. I also have the
baby pictures.
The butterflies are from Iguazu Falls on the
Argentinian side.
