Nov 16:  Salto, overnight bus to Iguassu Falls

I was out of bed at 9am but awake since 8am when I heard rain.  Ah.

Some people left to go to the spa for which Salto is known.  I decided I'd rather stay in on account of my sunburn (forehead was already peeling) and the rain.  Lori and Eli stayed behind as well (Eli had some work to do on the Internet).  I just sat in the hotel lobby and read.  We'd technically already checked out and were storing our bags in one common room.  Also I watched WWE Experience (with subtitles like "el Hombre Muerto") as well as Bewitched and Dukes of Hazzard dubbed in Spanish.  That's always the sign of a relaxing trip, like a few years ago at my brother's house when I was watching the Charlie's Angels movie in Spanish and was just too relaxed to change the channel.  This was indeed a do-nothing day.

Lori and Bob and Eli and I had lunch at an Italian restaurant, where I had a weak margarita with sugar instead of salt around the rim.

We took taxis from Salto back into Argentina.  Shaneela was fined $5 for losing her Uruguay entry card.  We continued past the border to the bus station in Concordia.  The bus departure was delayed so most people went to a bar across the street.  I didn't because I planned to take a sleep aid on the bus (either Unisom or...uh...whatever else might be floating around) and didn't want to mix it with alcohol.  I used the Internet briefly at the station (no Java though...I could only read e-mail, not reply, and all IMs appeared as the letter P) and finally made some live calls to Mr. Domestic and the Notorious BLG.  I did go to the bar briefly to see what was going on.  The mugging story now had a new twist:  Reportedly, someone back at the bar that night grabbed 5000 pesos off the counter and gave it to Lance, so he came out even.

The overnight bus (coach) was nice...comfortable, leg room, dinner...the 28-hour ride to Paraguay would have been just fine.  Or 16 hours, whatever it was.  We started off on a dark road where one might see a ghost bus coming from the other direction and pass right through it.

There was a thunderstorm and we were trying to photograph the lightning out the front of the bus.  Eli's camera messed up the contrast here but you can see kind of a pinkish hue in the upper center.  If not for another C-block I wouldn't have been sitting behind her.  All right, YOU try to photograph lightning.  It goes too fast.  It's like trying to catch lightning in a bottle.

We started to watch Scary Movie 4 on the bus, but the sound went off and we were left with Spanish subtitles.  Not quite as funny from that point.  Most of us conked out after that.  But a few things woke/kept us up during the night:

• We hit a bump and the TV in the front of the bus dislodged and fell to the floor, narrowly missing Lance and Lori.
• Brid had a coughing fit.  This prompted some people to wake up and start talking.  What the fuck?  It's bad enough one person is keeping everybody up with coughing she's struggling to suppress.  Not her fault.  So why make more noise complaining about it?  If they were French, I'd understand.  And to go off on a tangent, or perhaps more of a cosecant, why do people insist on asking the cougher if she is OK?  What possible reply can she give?  Either a cough-laden "yes", because she's obviously not choking to death (sorry, no lifesaving opportunity here, which means you get no thank-you sex in return, you dick), or no answer at all, because it's difficult to answer when you're FUCKING COUGHING.  And what's with offering the cougher a drink of water?  Coughing occurs in the trachea.  Water goes down the esophagus.  They're two completely different fucking pipes!  I knew that when I was like 4 years old.  To quote Eric the Midget:  "Get a brain!"
• The bus swerved wildly.  Eli thinks we were up on two tires during that maneuver.  Or tyres and manoeuvre.
• A lightning bolt struck very close to the bus.  Loud explosion.
• Radha and Shaneela had a giggle fit.

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