Day 71: Villarrica

A seven-hour-long, and unimaginably dusty, bus ride over scarlet-coloured sand roads got me to the town of Villarrica, in central Paraguay. Quiet, quaint, and virtually untouristed, it was irresistible. The first thing I did was to sample a Paraguayan speciality: tereré. This is a herbal tea, rather like Argentinian maté, which you see people sipping all time through a metal 'straw' from tankards they carry round with them, which they constantly top up with water. But while maté is hot, tereré is cold, using iced water (pic).





I didn't really care for maté, which smells like grass clippings and tastes like ashtrays. Tereré, served here at a stall by Villarrica bus station, is more complicated, using fresh herbs and plant extracts skilfully combined (pic). It still smells like grass clippings and tastes like ashtrays.


Villarrica is an attractive place to explore, with some picturesque colonial buildings (pic). The pace of life is slow: it takes them a while to get round to cutting vegetation down.


The 'Plaza de los Heroes' commemorates locals who fought in the many wars of recent centuries. Paraguay seems to have picked unwise fights at various times with everyone around them, including themselves, and usually come off worst, including with themselves.


There isn't much to see or do in Villarrica, and locals make their own entertainment: arm wrestling... (pic).


...or fishing in the local park (pic). But it's a nice friendly place, and I didn't have a wrong word with anybody. Though that's probably because most of them only speak Guaraní, the indigenous language.

Of course, if you don't like arm wrestling or fishing, you can always watch paint dry instead (pic). Probably while sipping tereré all afternoon.



In the evening I had a leisurely beer at a corner bar and watched the locals flock past on motorbikes. The average number of people per bike is 2, because most bikes have two people on them, and for every single rider, there's a family of three (pic). The average number of helmets per bike is 0.05. I saw some drivers casually sipping tereré, texting, and eating fruit as they trundled along. Yes, all at the same time. Clearly riding a motorbike is very safe here.