Salto Cristal

As you know my time here in Paraguay is winding down and the opportunities to see the treasures of Paraguay diminishing. Luckily, I have some great friends who were able to take me for a trip to a beautiful waterfall in the department of Paraguari called Salto Cristal. I had been there once before during my first month in Paraguay with my host sister, Laura, and her church youth group. That trip was great, but this trip was even better.

We planned to leave around 7:30 am starting with a trip to the grocery store to get some sandwich supplies and then to Soperia La Familia, my novio's business, to get some yummy sopa, Paraguayan corn bread, before picking up Angelic and a swedish volunteer, Emmanuel. Of course in good Paraguayan fashion, and partly my fault, we got a late start, heading out closer to 8:00.



Once everyone, all 8 of us, and everything was packed into the suburban we headed towards Villarrica. Once we were near Carlos, the Baranda family dad, advised that we would be stopping by his friend's house, I think it was to convince them to come with us. This stop turned into a terere session and it was nearly an hour later when we got back on the road. Then we were off to find our way to Salto Cristal.

We were told that there were signs that marked where we needed to turn off the road. Unfortunately the sign was tiny and was only visible coming from the opposite direction. So once we arrived at the nearby town, we turned around and asked directions a few times, eventually finding the turn-off.



We then found ourselves in the middle of a sugarcane plantation. After driving around the red dirt paths we eventually found the signs that marked the way to the waterfall.



When we arrived at the gate to the parking area we turned around to find that our friends Jonathan and Dale were in the car behind us accompanied by their lovely significant others. Crazy coincidence!

After piling out of the truck we headed down the path to the waterfall. We didn't realize that it would be a pretty steep path climbing down large rocks. But we made it and eventually got to the waterfall.







There we spread out and ate our lunch, since it was after noon, and then jumped into the water. Dale showed off his bouldering and diving skills. And eventually we all climbed onto the rock and jumped off.





After a few hours of playing around and sunning ourselves, we headed back up the path to check out the top of the falls.







Then we piled back in the car and headed back to Oviedo. The return trip was much shorter and we even got home before dark. It was a beautiful day and a great way to spend the last official day of summer.