At the airport in Sao Paulo I saw there was a lot of people waiting for the same flight to Foz do Iguacu. I thought I may have a half empty flight but there seemed to be lots of groups for some reason. I heard a couple of Australian and British accents which has been rare the last few weeks and there was also a big group of Chinese tourists fullfilling the stereotype but also a big bunch of grunge rock/skate dudes/girls waiting to board. Well it became clear when I landed! The Chinese tourists were well, being tourists but all the others were in town for the X games! I did not know this was on but since I was here maybe I would try and attend.

For the first time on my own, I had the ´hostel experience´ I was expecting and looking for at some point. I sat around the bar with some Brazilian guys and a couple of young French girls who were also travelling around and the usual conversation of where are you from, where have you been, where are you going, ensued. A genuinely friendly bunch of people and it was nice just to hang out and have a few drinks and a few laughs.

The next day I was on a mission to get a lot done. I was going to visit the falls in the afternoon but set about trying to get a ticket to the Xgames in the morning. People at the hostel had said the skating was sold out but I wanted to see if there were tickets for something else. I'm not usually into skating/moto-x/bmx biking but this was one of the those random right place/right time experiences that I convinced myself I should not miss. At the ticket office I was rewarded with a ticket for the street skating elimination rounds for the next day so I was happy. I would be staying an extra day in Foz do Iguazu.

So the afternoon was spent at the Brazilian side of the Iguacu Falls. I was told the Brazilian side was nice but the Argentinian side was better. Well if that's the case the Argentinean side must be impressive as the Brazilian side was quite spectacular. Especially when you get up close to the most powerful falls and feel the magnitude of nature's power, it is quite impressive. I had a huge grin on my face just standing on the platform getting soaked by the spray and deafened by the noise. Part of the xgames was actually being hosted in the park near the falls so there were many classic pictures of riders on the big air half pipe, with the falls in the background providing the setting. I managed to get a glimpse of a few of them practicing. Happy with the days outing I was feeling relaxed and found myself at the hostel bar again with the same crew and a couple of additions. Tiago (one of the Brazilian guys) was really friendly and was so comfortable at this hostel he was even running the bar at one point. He wasn't from Iguacu but had been here before and he was leading the crew for a night out and took us out to a local bar which tonight had 'soul/funk' night....right up my street.

I thought it would be rammed at the xgames but there was plenty of space. It was mainly full of teenagers and young twenty somethings but it was a relaxed atmosphere. I got to see the skating which attracted the biggest crowds I think, even though I didn't have a clue who the riders were. During the break some guy asked me to fill in a questionnaire and I was rewarded with a ticket to the moto-x, so I was now going to spend the evening there too. The BMX jumping was also on and you could see this from anywhere in the park so by the end of the evening I got to see all events. It looked spectacular on TV when I had seen these events previously, so I was happy that I got to see it all live in one day. These guys are freaks and truly have no fear. The funniest part of the day though was seeing all the kids line up for autographs. Not funny in itself but seeing the skaters who were younger than the fans signing the autographs was amusing for me. I forgot how young these skaters are.

Well that was it for Brazil, time to brush up on the Spanish again and head to Argentina.