The last morning at Iguazú a storm comes over, and the Garganta del Diablo turns into something else entirely.
From the lookout to the south the whole falls sit under a black shelf of cloud with one band of white light along the horizon behind them. The water is the only bright thing in the frame and it is two kilometres away.
The Garganta itself is a horseshoe about 80 metres across at the head, with the Iguazú river folding into it from three sides. Standing on the catwalk at the lip, you cannot see the bottom. The spray comes back up out of the gorge as a solid grey column and everything below the rim is simply gone. The rail is wet, the deck is wet, the camera is wet.
The birds in the mist
There is a bird working the column of spray — broad-winged, black, riding the updraught over the throat and turning without a wingbeat. Given the setting it is most likely a black vulture, which is everywhere here; the great dusky swifts that nest behind the falls fly quite differently and in flocks. I photographed it against pure grey with no reference for size, so I will not pretend to be certain.
The last frame from Iguazú is the river running over the shallow lip a few metres upstream of the drop, filling the width of the picture, and beyond it nothing at all — just cloud where the ground should be.
Near the hotel, a Brazilian guinea pig seems unfazex by my presence. Tomorrow, Buenos Aires.
