October 16th 2024 – Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil

Hotel Florida in Filadelfia ended up being our home for 12 days. It was the time it took for Matthias to get the parts needed, rebuild the engine and make sure that we hadn’t missed an underlying issue that could have contributed to the engine failure. Aside from the damaged piston and cylinder the inside of the engine looked like new. Lubrication and cooling system seemed to work perfectly. Matthias cleaned the fuel filter and injector. He also installed a wideband O2 sensor and did a test run to make sure that the stoichiometric mixture was correct and the bike wasn’t running rich or lean. The fueling was spot on – just like Maverick from 550 Performance had told me it would be. Matthias was very impressed with the engine performance. He said it was the best CRF 300 he had ever ridden.
With no other issues found, the best bet is that we just encountered a perfect storm of circumstances that overwhelmed the oil’s ability to create a sufficient film resulting in contact between the piston and the cylinder. I suspect that part of the reason is that we might have been running fake Motul oil that wasn’t up to spec..?

Being stranded like this tests my patience but I have to say Filadelfia and its inhabitants treated us very well during our stay. We became regulars at the gym, did a lot of running in town and swimming in the big pool just outside our room – the later was a blessing as the temperatures most days were well over 40℃ (104℉). The cozy air conditioned lobby of the hotel served as our living room. It was also one of the hubs of social life in town. As a result we got to know several of the locals.

One day the hotel was more crowded than usual. It turned out that the national power supply to town was down. The Fernheim cooperative owned hotel had its own emergency generator and people came to escape the heat. Matthias dropped by with his wife and kids. Normally the pool was for guests only, but the hotel manager (Matthias’ former harp teacher) had allowed him to use it to cool off the kids.
We ended up spending several hours together. It was a pleasure. Katrine and I invited them for dinner at the hotel’s restaurant before they returned home.

The weather changed the day we finally picked up the bike from the shop. I rode it back to the hotel in a slight drizzle on muddy roads. It was wonderful to have both bikes parked in front of our room and preparing to leave.

It rained heavily all night. The air was fresh and the temperatures comfortable when we set out under a clear blue sky the following morning. Being on the move again felt exhilarating, but our already fragile confidence in the bikes had taken a hit. Not being able to pinpoint the cause of the engine failure with certainty makes it even harder not to worry about it happening again. The only thing we could do for now was to cross our fingers, hope for the best and try to break-in the new engine parts properly.
The latter would be a bit of a challenge as the route to Acunsión consisted of 450 km straight roads with no elevation change. It sounds more boring than it was. The road was surrounded by exotic and lush flora populated with a rich and diverse fauna. I have never seen so many birds of prey and vultures in a single day.

The highlight of the day was when we saw an ostrich. I just managed to snap a picture before it noticed I had stopped and started acting like this.

The area wasn’t as wild as it appeared to be at first glance. Nowadays most of The Chaco is farmland. We often passed ranch entrances and saw big herds of cattle.

While I was cruising along at a steady pace, Katrine tried to vary the engine load by alternately cruising, accelerating and engine braking in an attempt to let the piston rings bed in. We took 2 long breaks during the day to let the engine cool down. The bike was running great all day and we slowly regained trust in the engine. A few kilometers from our destination, while navigating the traffic of downtown Asunción, Katrine’s bike suddenly died. She called me on the intercom while coasting to the side of the road.
The bike looked fine. No leaks anywhere. Oil and coolant level OK. No warning lights. She told me it had died like if she had hit the kill switch – not like the last time when it had run poorly for a few seconds before stuttering to a halt. I turn the key off then on, let the fuel pump prime and hit the starter button. The engine sprang to life and sounded perfectly normal. I drove the bike the rest of the way to the hotel in case something happened again. It didn’t. The engine felt and sounded as it should.

We had booked accommodation not far from the city center. Like many other places we have stayed this also had a story. This place was run by the Hüttemann family. They owned a patisserie on the ground floor of the building and an auto repair shop next door. Mr. and Mrs Hüttemann lived on the premises in a separate part of the house. He was a retired engineer and spent most of his time taking care of his wife who suffered from severe Alzheimer’s. As a result he rarely left the house. One of their daughters, Astrid, had been concerned that the isolation would have a negative effect on her father’s mental health now that none of the kids live at home anymore. So she had persuaded him to turn part of the big house into a B&B. She handled the booking and online communication side of things while he greeted the guests when they arrived. They clearly enjoyed working together on the project and were doing really well.

After the previous day’s excitement with Katrine’s bike, we needed a day off the bikes to recuperate. That would also give us an opportunity to explore the capital. First stop was a farmers market at the local plaza. There was a good atmosphere and lots of nice things to eat and drink. Just as we were about to leave, a young woman came over and said that she recognized us from Hotel Florida in Filadelfia where she had stayed a few days earlier. It’s a small world. Her name was Nadia. She was really nice and we talked for quite some time.

Asunción was an interesting melting pot of new, old, beauty, decay, bustle and tranquility. Nice and friendly people everywhere added to the experience. I’m glad that we decided to spend a whole day in the city.

Sunday morning is the best time to ride through a big city. Traffic was light and the temperatures comfortable as we made our way east. We passed several big groups of motorcycle riders gathering for rideouts. Everyone had dressed nicely. The guys looked sharp, the girls pretty and the mood was high.
Eventually we left the city behind and traversed an increasingly undulated landscape covered in greenery.
At one point we were joined by 2 young couples on motorcycles. They were all smiles. One of the girls riding pillion gifted Katrine a sunflower at 80 km/h before they left us.

Our destination for the day was Presidente Franco, a town on the border to both Brazil and Argentina. Torsten greeted us in the driveway to his small hostel at the edge of town. Its location only 20 minutes walk from The Monday Falls had made us pick the place.
As expected Torsten only accepted cash payment. I had just enough Guaranies left in cash to get us through our last day in Paraguay. Getting rid of the money would turn out to be a bit of a challenge.
Before leaving for the waterfalls I settled my bill with Torsten. He decided to give us a discount on the room.

Usually foreigners pay more than nationals to visit the falls. When the cashier at the entrance learned that we didn’t have a Paraguayan ID he insisted on giving us a 50% “birthday discount”. Nice guy.
The waterfalls and the area around the river was beautiful.

The plan was to pick up something for dinner on our way back, but we couldn’t find a restaurant that was open. Back at the hostel I asked Torsten if he had any suggestions for where we could find something to eat? It resulted in an invitation to join him and his wife, Secillia, for a trip downtown to the annual town fair that was in full swing. When we got there they insisted on buying us enough local delicacies to make us full. Only because they let us pay for beers did I manage to spend any money – and then only a few, as the bartender kept giving me a discount. It was getting silly.
It was a pleasure to get to know Torsten and Secillia. He had moved to Paraguay from Germany when he retired as an engineer 26 years earlier. 10 years ago he moved in with Secillia. She works as an architect and has designed the house they live in. They were both energetic people and seemed to be very fond of each other.

All 4 of us had breakfast together at 6 am. It was only a short ride to the border, but we wanted to get there while the temperatures were still tolerable. 15 minutes after leaving the hostel we parked in front of the Paraguayan immigration building by the bank of the Paraná River. Getting us and the bikes stamped out of Paraguay only took a few minutes.
The International Friendship Bridge that spans the river and connects Ciudad del Este in Paraguay with Foz do Iguaçu in Brazil is the definition of chaos. It’s a bottleneck for the up towards 100,000 people that cross daily. Cars and trucks move at a snail pace while motorcycles filter between the lines. The vast majority must be locals that don’t need to do/show any paperwork as there were no lines at immigration or costumes on either side of the river.
Immigration on the Brazilian side was a breeze. Getting the TIP took a bit longer, but all in all it went smoothly and we spent less than 2 hours at the border.

Although divided only by a river, the urban areas on either side of the border were worlds apart. Foz do Iguaçu on the Brazilian side was significantly more modern and posh. We had booked a room for 3 nights at a small hostel near the city center. The host had allowed us to check in early. We arrived mid morning. It left us with the better part of a day to get a feel for the new country and sort out practical stuff like getting cash and SIM cards.

We had been warned that getting a Brazilian SIM card was difficult for foreigners and could take days. The Vivo store we visited told us they couldn’t sell us a SIM card and asked us to try the nearby CLARO store. When we got there they asked for a ridiculous high price and we could only pay in cash and wouldn’t get a receipt. Luckily I had read reviews of that particular store and had learned that they were running a scam with overpriced SIM cards that only worked for a couple of days. On advise from our host we visited a Shell gas station next. They sold SIM cards from TIM for a few bucks and had no issues with selling to foreigners. They even helped us activate the cards and made sure that the phones worked before we left the store.

With the practicalities out of the way we spent the following day visiting Iguazu Falls – the largest waterfall system in the world. The falls are located in Iguaçu National Park. An inDrive dropped us off at the entrance to the park, where we bought tickets before getting on a bus that took us to the head of the trail that runs along the falls. I knew the place would be crawling with tourists, but this was something I just had to see. Luckily the park ran a smooth operation and did what they could to provide the visitors with a good experience.
We walked along the falls for about an hour. The views were spectacular and the scale mindblowing. It was an experience I will never forget.

Back at the entrance we crossed the road to visit Parque das Aves. We hadn’t heard about the bird park until the previous day, but since then several locals had recommended it to us. I’m not that much into birds, but this really was something special. We followed a trail through the park that wound its way through several vast aviaries teeming with exotic birds.

We enjoy staying in Foz do Iguaçu. The place has a nice vibe and doesn’t feel like a border town at all. Everything we need is within walking distance and people are super friendly. The language is a bit of a challenge now that it has changed from Spanish to Brazilian Portuguese which sounds like a mix of Spanish, Japanese and Dutch – but that just adds to the experience.