Turning 30 South American Style With the dreaded 30th birthday looming, I ran away to South America to celebrate the landmark birthday in style.

Super touristy Iguazu falls were every bit as lovely as I hoped they would be. You can hear the water crashing down for miles around as the spray hits the air and huge big birds of prey circle overhead. Ace. We hit the Argentinian side first, even getting up early in honour of the occasion to hit the park before the masses arrived on tour buses. We caught a glimpse of some cheeky little raccoon style creatures whose name escapes me and walked along a lovely woodsy trail for about half an hour before seeing out first cascade. It was lovely, a huge great thing surrounded by trees and dainty little yellow flowers, a real bounty advert in the making. Then there was more, and more, and more. There was literally another waterfall everywhere you looked. We did a trail on the bottom first, getting soaked by the spray which was lovely in the heat, then a trail around the top to look down over the water as it crashed down below. We even got a little boat out to the island where the huge birds of prey were sat, about as large as a toddler and just looking at us as if sizing us up for the cooking pot. Steve ran at them waving his arms to get a shot of them in flight on his camera but they looked unimpressed.
The whole park was covered in butterflies, huge big yellow things that at one point swarmed around the train like a big shower of tropical confetti which was lovely. Tried to get a shot of it on the camera but it didn´t really turn out.
After lunch we got a train ride out to the main event, the devil´s throat, which is the big semi circular one that made the place famous and it was spectacular. So hypnotic you could stand there for hours watching it, or at least until you got dug in the ribs by a group of Japanese tourists eager to get you out of their holiday photos.
On the walk up we crossed a huge swamp, the source of the water that feeds the falls and saw a crococilde happily sunning himself in the swamp. A man´s wedding ring was lying next to him in the water. Pity the poor man who has to fish that out or explain to his wife what happened to it.
The next day we took everybody´s advice and went across to the Brazilian side of the falls, merrily skipping across the border without stopping at customs as illegal immigrants. The view from this side was spectacular.  You can really see it as a wall of water with all the waterfalls lined up side by side as far as the devil´s throat. The walkway takes you out into the centre of the ring of water as well which was very wet and refreshing. You are right in the middle of it all on the Argentinian side which is great and there is loads more to do, but the view from Brazil was better.