A Paraguayan tourist experience

Since rocking up in this country a little over two weeks ago I have done my best to make the most of what there is to see here; when visiting the falls Izzy and I scheduled in a trip to see the Itapu Dam, the second biggest hydroelectric dam in the world (China beating Paraguay, and the rest of the world, with superior technology a few years ago). A monumental abomination (destroying falls bigger than those I went to see) making Paraguay the biggest supplier of hydroelectricity in the world (and a big reason why my current Wednesday evening activity is to sit in the dark, wearing a headtorch, playing cards- oh yes, powercuts are frequent and loooong). You can tell how thrilling I found this experience by the fact it wasn´t even mentioned in the relevant blog.

However, I mention it now because I feel it perfectly underlines my inability to believe that this country has nothing to offer a tourist, in the sense that the Friday past saw my colleagues and I enbark on a two hour bone shaking bus journey to see 'The Vatican City of Paraguay'. A place hailed by the Paraguayan tourist board as a monument to rival that of Rome. Naturally when we got there we found not architecture to rival Italy but a single smegging church, which was very pretty in its own way, but definately not worth the crippling two hour, 35 degree journey (the picture shows the entirety of Vatican City- apprently thousands visit here at Xmas, it´s beyond me how they fit them all in).

On the plus side it did prove that no matter how removed a country is from a traditional tourist trade the scope for manufacturing total crap still abounds. And trust me, if this country had anything nearing a postal system one of the delightful figurines pictured below would be winging its way towards the garden of Dudley Road. My favourite one was Spongebob Squarepants.

We visit the Jesuit Missions next week, a Lonely Planet reccommended visit (but then again so was the damn dam). I think my optimism keeps me young...