I confirm the are huge colonies of Memonites too in Bolivia on the track to San Ignacio heading to Brazil, east of Santa Cruz. I talked with a few of them during a riding stop in a bar and...i wondered if they just didnt come from another planet...rolled their eyes like a fried fish watching the zoom of my digital camera, asked me which language was talked in France, if it was far from Germany...I did check if their lil finger was foilded to make sure they were not some of those invadors chasing David Vincent in the 1960s tv series...

Lol, that gave me a good laugh. I have a friend who grew up on a farm in a small town and some of the questions he would ask me about sports made me wonder if he grew up on another planet too.

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http://www.journeyrider.net Latin America blog (07-8)

Hey guys, now that I have been to Paraguay I wanted to update this thread with my info.

According to my Lonely Planet most non EU citizens including Americans, Australians, Canadians, and New Zelanders need a visa. For Americans the price is $100 US I think, for Canadians and Australians the price is $40 US for sure. To get the visa you must go to the capital city of the neighboring country that you will be crossing the border from. In the capital city you have to go to Paraguay's Embassy and apply for your visa which took me 2 days to get (it can take up to 3 days or less than 24 hours if you are lucky).

To apply for the visa you need to give the embassy your passport and wait the 1-3 day period it takes. Make sure you check at the embassy at least once a day and ask if your passport is still there. The embassy person may tell you (like they did me) to wait an hour and your passport will be ready. This probably means that you will have to wait 5 hours and have the embassy person apologize and tell you to come back the next day.

Note: In Buenos Aires the office of the Paraguayan embassy is near the subway station Callao (on the corner of Avenida Callao and Avenida Scalabrini Ortiz). The street it is on runs parallel to Scalabrini Ortiz and is the neighboring street. (I will try and update this asap but looking around for 10 minutes and asking a few people will allow you to find it to.
Note: You need to pay the embassy in US dollars but unfortunately there are no atms that dispense US in Buenos Aires so you will have to visit a Casa de Cambio.


Once you have your visa you are set for Paraguay. Just make sure that you cross at one of the mainstream border crossings so you can get your entry stamp and not have to pay a penalty fee at the next country. Be careful if you are crossing from the East because to my knowledge only Ciudad del Este has an immigration office. The other points around the country are Encarnation from Argentina, Fortin General Eugenio A. Garay from Bolivia, Pilar from Argentina, Puerto Iguazu from Argentina (by cheap ferry), Foz do Iguacu from Brazil (by bridge) and Pero Juan Cabalero from Brazil.


BTW: Pretty much everything x-filtrate said in the second post was correct. The only thing I found different was that you do not need small denominations of US dollars to pay for your visa, but it is probably not a bad idea in case you get the official in a bad mood that day.
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Here is information I thought was useful from the Trans Chaco thread:

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http://www.journeyrider.net Latin America blog (07-8)

I read a post on lonelyplanet.com/thorntree from an Australian guy that waited 3 days for his Brazilian visa in Buenos Aires, and then was denied because he didn`t have a return ticket out as he was travelling (by public transport) overland wherever the wind blew. And a few other people had issues there, but then the same guy went to the Brazilian consulate in Puerto Iguaza and had the visa in 2hrs. He said they mainly gave him advice on where to go in Brazil than ask him questions. So I figured that in this part of Argentina it would be similar for Paraguay, and this morning I obtained a Paraguayian visa from the consulate in Posadas in 1hr, like they said! And treated me above average probably because i`m and extrajero (foreigner) instead of the dirty biker that I am.
They`re open from 7-11am each business day.

Good post, I wish that I had known that you could get your Brazillian visa in Puerto Iguaza. That way I could have taken the bridge from Puerto Iguazu to Ciudad del Este. (Some people say it is possible to cross the bridge without the Brazilian visa.)

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http://www.journeyrider.net Latin America blog (07-8)

The ferry Gato Gato was talking about is about 10km south of Ciudade del Este (PAR) where it crosses straight across the river to Puerto Iguazu (ARG). I know it leaves PAR around 8:30am and returns around 4pm, and parks overnight on the ARG side so must be an hour or 2 earlier for the other direction.
But i didn´t want to wait so rode over the bridge to Brazilian immigration/customs and the one immigration officer on duty said that "it isn´t right, but just ride through Foz De Iguazu (BRA) without stopping until you arrive at ARG entry. So i did, checked out the falls on ARG side while my Brazilian visa was issuing (5hrs with no more than passport & 2 photos required, open 8am) in Puerto Iguazu, and then when i re-entered Brazil to travel through Brazil proper, i stopped at their immigration and customs for the stamps and import doc. Kind of funny since i´d already ridden through their country!
At both borders each of the countries had about 5 customs officers for every immigration officer, so that demonstrates what their priorites are.