Review of JetSmart flight Foz Do Iguaçu → Santiago in Economy

You just don't post a report about an unremarkable flight. You will jeopardize your reputation as a flight-reporter!

That's why these photos were stored on my laptop since last September. They were meant to fall into oblivion among other thousands of photos of my cats.

But winter is here again, it's pouring down outside, and I'm sooooo bored…..

Reason enough to write about an unremarkable flight and jeopardize my reputation as a flight-reporter.

However, the destination was very remarkable! So let's begin with this brief pre-flight bonus of…

iguazu Falls

I was very lucky. 2023 turned out to be a rainy year in the Amazon, so the waterfalls were in all their glory.

Have a look at these videos I filmed myself. This is what the waterfalls look like from the Brazilian side.

You might want to turn the volume up!

What you see on all these videos is the waterfalls ON the Argentinean side FROM the Brazilian side. The view is quite impressive from here, but the experience is more complete when you visit the Argentinian side.

The largest waterfall, seen at the bottom of this waterfall-lined canyon, is the Garganta do Diabo (Garganta del Diablo for me) or the Devil's Throat, THE MOTHER OF ALL WATERFALLSSSS….

The trail on this side takes you all along the Brazilian side to the Devil's Throat.

The waterfalls are the main attraction of a large park where the original forest has been preserved. It's like a patch of greenery in the midst of devastation that extends for thousands of kilometers in every direction.

The forest itself is full of wonders, and a trip to Iguazu will not be complete without a tour of the forest, so I booked a bike tour. One of the things we found while biking around the park was an unexpected sort of butterfly migration. No idea where they were going, but we were going along the bike path, when suddenly thousands of yellow butterflies came out of the forest to the road and fluttered around us in the opposite direction for several hundreds of meters. It was… surreal… oneiric!! Even our guide was surprised. She had never seen this phenomenon before. I was very lucky. I was able to capture only a few butterflies on this video, but you can hear our guide say "Parece um filme!" (It looks like a movie)

In summary, my visit to Foz do Iguazu and to the Iguazu waterfalls was a wonderful experience that I will gladly repeat.

I'm repeating the tips from my previous report here:

If you're planning on visiting the area, my advice is to stay in Foz. If you like, you can contact me and I'll be glad to tell you where I stayed because it turned out to be a great place at a very low price, located in a wonderful neighborhood downtown, with everything you need just meters away. Foz is nice and safe.

Leave one day to visit the Brazilian side of the waterfalls. You can buy the entrance online before your visit, or use one of the touch-screen self-serve booths at the entrance of the park. Credit cards accepted. There's a lot of discussion about which is more beautiful, the Argentinean or the Brazilian side. Let me tell you - both are stunning and complement each other. For example, the most impressive waterfall in the park is the Garganta do Diabo/Garganta del Diablo (the Devil's Throat). On the Argentinean side you watch it directly from above. You feel you're going to be swallowed by it. Really humbling. On the Brazilian side you watch it from underneath. Equally impressive and humbling, and you get completely soaked with the mist. So, to live the complete experience, you HAVE to visit both sides.

Leave another day (or two) to visit the Argentinean side. The trails on this side are longer. Get ready to walk a lot. There are three trail levels (heights). My advice is to start with the Garganta del Diablo and then go for the lowest trail, which happens to be the longest and the most impressive. The highest trail is not so interesting because you see everything from above. But this depends on you. I insist - whatever trail you take here, get ready to walk a lot. Fortunately, this side of the park has a cute little train that takes you to different stations. From my own experience - I enjoyed this side of the park walking on my own. I watched other tourists walking in groups i tours they booked in advance, and they were always tired and irritable because they couldn't keep up with the rest of the group or because they lost their group (there are dozens of them!) You'll enjoy yourself more if you go on your own, at your own pace.

You can move easily between the three cities by car, public transport, or even walking, as you'll see below.

And then you can leave one day to go shopping in Ciudad del Este. Just be careful with the cars and motorcycles! The traffic is crazy there! Did I mention that you should always purchase some kind of health insurance when you travel abroad? Just in case, you know? ?

Finally, learn some Spanish AND Portuguese. Some people speak some broken English here, but once you're out of your hotel you'll need some Spanish or Portuguese to communicate. And Brazilians DON'T speak Spanish! Written Spanish and Portuguese can be mutually intelligible at times, but the spoken language is completely different.

some extra hours in brazil

Changes to flight schedules are an inherent feature of JetSmart's service. Actually, I missed it in my previous flight and I was going to file a complaint.

But JetSmart delivers this time, and my original flight, scheduled for departure at the very convenient time of 8:20 PM, gets rescheduled for an ungodly 4:06 AM. Lovely.

I receive the notification via SMS in the morning of the day of the flight, while getting my bags ready.

I can download my updated cartão de embarque. It sounds so much prettier in Portuguese.

Don't get too excited when you read that the date for the flight is "sex," you dirty-minded reader. It's short for "sexta feira," (sixth day = Friday)

As I said, I was getting my bags ready. But of all the stuff you see on the bed, I only paid for the red bag, which is now about to explode with all the keepsakes, and there's no room for my dirty socks.

Foreseeing this situation (from previous experiences) I brought with me a fishing vest I got from aliexpress. Terrible quality, I don't recommend it, but there's space for all my toiletry, snacks, cables, charger, and dirty underwear in its many pockets.

The only problem is…

Do you think the gate staff will notice this…?

…or my laptop in the back pocket???

Hmmff… Something tells me this is not going to work.

At IGU

I'm not an owl person. I feel an uncontrollable need to get into my pajamas as soon as it gets dark, so you won't see me in the streets later than 10 PM.

But now JetSmart is asking me to head to the airport in a foreign city after midnight??? Not going to happen. It gives me the creeps!!

I wait for as long as I can, and end up calling an Uber a bit after 11.

Naturally, we find…

…an almost empty airport.

The main access leads to the middle of the hall. If you are late for your flight, just walk (or sprint) straight ahead all the way to the bottom over there, where the counters are, and you'll see the access to security check on your right.

But I'm not in a hurry at all, so I'll indulge myself with a tour around the landside premises.

This is the view to my right…

…and this is to my left.

Let's go to the left, where we find…

…mainly a lot of sitting room with too few seats…

…some airline desks…

(Brazilian airport designers love these white tiles that we reserve for bathrooms in Chile)

…and arrivals.

Lets see if the opposite end of the hall offers something more exciting.

Pão de queijo!! (Cheese bread) Yummy!!! One of my favorites in Brazil!!

A bit further is a second little food stall…

…and this map depicting the location of other airports managed by CCR Aeroportos. Yaaawwwnnnn…. I wonder if all of them are this boring.

Nothing else to be seen around here, apart from large spaces.

I'd better head for the counters, over there to the right.

It looks even creepier than the other side!

I eventually find a JetSmart lady ready at the counter, which is remarkable because it's not even midnight! I confirm with her that the shower gel I bought at SCL is not coming back with me. "Não. Não se va," she says in "Portuñol" when I show her the bottle. Her Portuguese accent is lovely, but it's still a cruelty. I liked my gel so much.

But she gives me a voucher for 80 reais that I can use airside! It's not as generous as the voucher that JetSmart gave me at SCL some months ago, but it's still good. It's about 14 USD.

And she prints my boarding pass with the new flight number. This is the first time I see a letter in a flight number.

Still plenty of time.

I snooze on a seat for the next hour or so, and then stand here until this gate is opened…

…and we can go through the police check.

I go straight to the food stall over there and change my voucher for more food than I can eat at the moment. Great!

As the rest of the airport, the room is big, gray and dull…

…but thank goodness the seats have some padding and you can lie on them.

And that's precisely what I do.

A visit to the restroom is a must before the flight.

And at long last, we are called to the gate.

This is when I start to wonder if I should have my credit card at hand in case I have to pay for my not very subtle fishing vest, which of course I'm not wearing, but carrying in my hand.

But the only staff I can see is one poor guy running among the passengers, very busy checking our tickets and calling some names over the PA system.

And I get away with it!!!

I didn't know it at the time…

…but the plane that I'm boarding…

…happens to be CC-AWT…

…which is JetSmart's very furst Airbus 321neo.

Inside, it's the traditional JetSmart cabin with non-reclinable ironing-board seats…

…but the legroom here in row 3 is quite remarkable.

Add to this that the middle seat is empty…

…and I can comfortably stretch my legs and get ready to have some rest.

In fact, as soon as we depart…

…I loose the notion of space and time…

…and wake up three hours later as we are flying above Mendoza, a city in Argentina at the foot of the Andes. Are you still there, stolen cellphone? 

We promptly start crossing the Andes, which look gorgeous at this time of day.

Some 10 minutes later…

…I can see the lights of Santiago on the other side…

…and the lights of some ski centers down there.

SCL is as foggy and lazy as my mind.

Eventually, we are welcomed…

…to pier D.

Arriving at the international terminal (T2) at SCL implies…

…a long walk…

…and I'll be waiting in line for quite a long time at immigration…

…because of a group of inexperienced Mormon kids that have a mess with their papers.

By the time I leave the terminal it's broad daylight outside…

…but I am so dizzy and sleepy after just three hours of sleep that this is precisely how I see the world - blurred!!

But, did I have fun?

I SURE DID!!!!