Hap Working The World

This post is a part of a series from my travels with friends Hazel and Ami from back home who are currently travelling South America. We went on a 3 day mission, camping at Ybycui which is “3 hours” by bus south of Asuncion. Then we went onto UNESCO classified Jesuit ruins of Encarnacion, located at the southern tip of Paraguay. These posts go to show that Paraguay is a travel destination that is more about the adventure, the experiences and people met, “it’s all about the journey man”! Enjoy.

After waiting a couple of hours for a collectivo that never showed up we made our way back to the centre of town. We managed to get a ride down the road that supposedly took us within 8km’s of the camp site. From the sign our “8km” trek started, and then 2 hours later we were still walking along the road that never ended. The prey that our missionary friends did for us must have paid off, as we stumbled across the super friendly old park ranger who was willing to sell us a beer for the road. Walking a never ending road seems a little easier with a beer in hand.

All roads lead to somewhere and ours led to a “light at the end of the tunnel”, well actually it was just a light on the side of the road attached to a ramshackle family house. It was dark; we had been walking for a couple of hours on what felt like a treadmill not a road. We went into ask the family sitting around on miscellaneous chairs and rural objects watching the men fixing a motorbike how much further to the campground. We were answered, “about 4-6 kms more” Paraguayan travel tip #546: don’t trust distances on road signs.

Thankfully the men offered to take us the rest of the way on their motorbikes for a small $5 fee (we didn’t read the small print and actually ended up having to stop off and buy a bottle of petrol as well – cheeky buggers). With Ami and Haze on the back of one bike and me on the other bike we took off following the solo headlight of my bike as the other bike had none, although the driver was using his cell phone to light up the road at times.

The road that never ended finally led to a potholed dirt road, our drivers hooting out load as they drove 2 tall and one dreadlock foreigner, a story they would be telling for the rest of their lives. We finally arrived at the camp site after leaving Asuncion 10 hours prior. We thanked our drivers with new found enthusiasm which can only be found when you know that you are lucky that you didn’t have to experience Paraguayan emergency response services.

What better way to celebrate arriving at our destination than a box of red wine. Travel tip # 679 don’t buy Paraguayan boxed wine, it tastes like something between urine and vinegar with red food colouring, lucky for us we had 3 litres or Argentinean wine in reserve.

This post is a part of a series from my travels with friends Hazel and Ami from back home who are currently travelling South America. We went on a 3 day mission, camping at Ybycui which is “3 hours” by bus south of Asuncion. Then we went onto UNESCO classified Jesuit ruins of Encarnacion, located at the southern tip of Paraguay. These posts go to show that Paraguay is a travel destination that is more about the adventure, the experiences and people met, “it’s all about the journey man”! Enjoy.

With a belly full of rice and sausages and god looking over us, our friend Melo walked us to the road outside his house to wait for the collectivo (bus) going to the camp ground. Dependant on who you talked to, the collectivo went by at either 2, 2.30, 3 or wasn’t going today.

Well 2 hours later we were still waiting and it was now obvious that it wasn’t coming today. But this is all part of the Paraguayan travel experience, there is no real tourist infrastructure. In most touristed countries you would be able to get a mini-van straight from Asuncion and go direct to the sights in one hour. But if you did that you wouldn’t get to have lunch with Melo and his friends or see Paraguayan country traffic and smiles pass you by.

Here’s a few photos of watching life pass you by on the side of a Paraguayan rural road.

There’s no need for tying loads down in Paraguay, just chuck your son’s on the back to hold it down.

It wouldn’t be a rural road without a random sprinkling of farm animals and a cart passing by.

I hope they are wearing their seat belts and have insurance. Is it just me or is that truck going to snap in the middle.

After 2 hours of watching life go by, it was time to take action, so we started walking back into town, for what? We didn’t know, but it felt good to be walking.

This post is a part of a series from my travels with friends Hazel and Ami from back home who are currently travelling South America. We went on a 3 day mission, camping at Ybycui which is “3 hours” by bus south of Asuncion. Then we went onto UNESCO classified Jesuit ruins of Encarnacion, located at the southern tip of Paraguay. These posts go to show that Paraguay is a travel destination that is more about the adventure, the experiences and people met, “it’s all about the journey man”! Enjoy.

OK, I know you’re all getting bored of me telling you how friendly people are over here. Well just encase you didn’t quite comprehend it the first hundred times I told you, I will tell you again.

We met Melo on the bus from Asuncion as we were drinking our bottles of cola bought from a street vendor, which on closer inspection saw that the seals had been broken. The suspicion was confirmed when we saw the old man who had sold us the bottles picking up bottles off the street. A great little business, getting used bottles and filling them up from a 2.5 litre bottle – that’s 3^rd world entrepreneurship at work.

Anyway, back to Melo, we believe that he was attracted to the vacant seat beside me due to the picture of Jesus with wide open arms on my t-shirt that said “put down the drugs and come get a hug”. Melo was a friendly Brazilian missionary who was working with the local impoverished of Ybycui.

When we got to Ybycui we found out that the collectivo (small local bus) that was going out to the camping area 26 km out of town was supposed to be “leaving” in an hour. Melo invited us back to his house for lunch.

In the house lived a family and other missionary types. Their hospitality was second to none, and after grace we were treated to a tasty feed of sausages and rice that would probably mean they wouldn’t eat for the next 2 days. Following this we were shown photos of their church back in Brazil and told many great things about what their church does. I had the feeling that they were waiting for the guy with Jesus on his shirt to tell them of all his Religious achievements, little did they know that today’s grace that was said doubled his grace experiences.

Before we knew it, it was time to leave the believing beaming Colgate smiles and go wait for the collectivo and feel a bit inadequate at how much we contribute to the world. But not before a pray was said for us, asking god to look over us in our coming travels. Thank you Melo and friends, another humbling experience that let’s you know the world is full of good people and not just the twisted excuses of people that appear on the 6 o’clock news– Oh and a shout out to Jesus, cheers bro.

Friends from back in Australia, Hazel and Ami are currently here in Asuncion visiting Mandy and I. Ami is a keen fisherman so we decided to go and give it ago. We went down to the Asuncion port and tried to rent a boat. The man lying down in one of the moored boats said he would take us for $AUD12/hr. But we decided to just take the leaking lopsided local ferry to the over side of the river as it was too expensive ($12 may not sound like much, but that can buy a lot of beer over here), and we would try our luck fishing off the riverbank.

15 minutes of listening to the crank start diesel engine battling for its life, we arrived in Chaco’i with the rest of the locals that were returning home. Although we were only on the other side of the river from Asuncion it felt like a world away. We were met my old men chilling out on the grassy banks, wandering cows and donkeys and a silence that was only broken by crowing roosters.

Still wanting to hire a boat we approached a deteriorating concrete house and I poked my head through the open door to a family relaxing in their living room. I asked if they knew anyone that would let us rent their row boat. The lady spat something out in Guarani (the local language) to her eldest son. He hopped up and we followed him down to the shore.

“Which boat do you want?” he said, pointing to the 5 well used row boats that littered the muddy bank. I got the feeling they had never rented out the boats before, who knows they probably weren’t even their boats. And in Paraguayan tourism styles, he hands us an anchor and a bit of scrap wood for an extra seat and says good bye. There’s no signing liability clauses, putting down a deposit, or even giving our names, or even paying. By the way when I asked how much per hour he looks blankly, shrugs his shoulders and says “$AUD4 for the afternoon”.

With our new boat, off we went on a fishing experience that was more about the experience than the fishing, check out the photos.

Ami standing by the boats that litter the shore (Asuncion skyscape in the background).

Looks pretty bloody nice doesn’t it, we even had an otter come and join us, pity the fish didn’t follow.

Who needs a motor when you have oars and arms like these! Drinking terere and looking like a hippy. Seriously, would you rent your boat out to someone looking like this and not get a deposit? You have to love Paraguay. The picture below reminds me of a song, “get a haircut, get a real job”.

Coming back to drop off the boat. Ami battling the oars that have no brackets, they are just tied onto the boat. It required a lot of effort (I have the blisters to show), 3 right hand rows to 1 left.

Back in Asuncion having a well deserved beer with the president. This bar is a snipers dream, right in front of the “government palace”, Asuncion’s version of the white house.