And, Ive spoken to various other travellers along my way about the place. And some say its wonderful and impressive, and some say its terribly touristy and disappointing.
And the question is, "what will it be for me"?
I usually dont have a great time when there are hordes of "the General Public" involved! I prefer less touristy destinations or "harder to get to" natural wonders like mountain tops :)
What to do?... No way I can avoid the hordes and Ive decided Im gonna go see it...
So, I decided Id try to give it the best chance I could of "me having a good time"
And thus, I decided to "do it in full Tourist style" :)))
When I got to the town at the boarder (where all the tourists stay) I found a place to stay, asked a few questions, and promptly booked myself in on an "adventure boat ride" up into the falls from below...
Lets see what happens shall we :)
... And so I went and "did the tourist thing"
First up was the boat trip...
... That was AWESOME :)))
They really get you right up into the waterfalls... Not so that the boat gets swamped and flooded, but far enough in so that you cant see a thing cos there is spray EVERYWHERE and going in every direction... If you didnt wear your swimming costume then after this little trip, you are well and truly soaked through! They do give you a roll-top bag to protect your stuff, so its OK, but I kept my camera out and under my jacket for a couple of pictures... needless to say it got completely soaked and I was taking blurry pictures for the next twenty minutes... Then it stopped working all together and I spent an hour while it dried out :)
Next was a walk around on the lower trails looking up at some of the falls (there are quite a few of them dont you know :)
Well, that was not exciting, but it was good. They have walk ways up into the spray of a couple of the falls, and there is a good amount of space for all the tourists... They seem to come through in waves of a hundred or so (from the boats disgorging their loads)... It works well. If you want a less crowded picture then you just have to wait till the crowd thins out between groups.
So, then I had to get the camera going before going up to the upper walkways...
The upper walkways were likewise well made and gave excellent views as well as handling the huge volume of tourists very well...
The fascinating part for me was watching the relatively smooth quiet brown flowing water go over the edge and seeing it all "jostling for position" so to speak, and then leaping out into the void and plunging downward... Breaking up from river to stream to splash to droplets and foam and finally spray... COOOOOL :)))
And then it was a little train ride followed by a long walk out across the river to "the big attraction" what they call "The Devils Throat"...
MAGNIFICENTLY SPECTACULAR!
The pictures do absolutely no justice at all to the view of this massive wall of water plunging down into the mist with the sound of continual thunder!... Completely mesmerising! Watching the water transform as it falls... I spent an hour there just watching... :))))
... And then there was the walk back, and then I spent a while trying to photograph all the amazing butterflies (some in the next post).
"Embracing the Horror" worked out fine... WOW... Good day :)))
