Twelve Border Crossings In Twelve Hours (October 1988)

 La Triple Frontera is a confusing area where the borders of Paraguay, Argentina, and Brazil converge.  For the traveller wishing to enter Paraguay from Argentina at this juncture, it helps to know the rules.  I unfortunately did not.  As a result, within the space of two hours, I found myself visiting each of those three countries twice and having crossed and re-crossed borders many more times.  If one counts borders entered and exited that day involving the three countries, I technically had crossed twelve of them, albeit the same ones several times.   This might qualify for some sort of record but for the fact that my situation, based on current Internet postings, may well not be unique in the annals of confused travellers at this location.   

The goal seemed simple enough.  I planned to make my way from Puerto Iguazú, a small dusty Argentinian town near world famous Iguassu Falls to Ciudad Puerto Stroessner (now Ciudad del Este), an equally dusty and also cheesy discount shopping mecca in Paraguay.   This was to be the first leg of a trip to Paraguay’s capital of Asuncion.

Although I was aware that the bus from Argentina passed briefly through a several mile stretch of Brazil’s southwest corner, it was in essence a bus travelling from Argentina with the sole purpose of depositing passengers just short of the Paraguayan border checkpoint.  A momentary presence in Brazil seemed irrelevant.

Although the bus stopped briefly when leaving Argentina and entering Brazil with a handful of passengers getting off and back on, the fact that almost all other passengers remained in their seats added to my false optimism.  It was only later that I learned that locals who make this trip regularly have a special visa allowing travel through all borders without going through passport control.     

After the short trip, passport in hand and visa in order, I made my way to the Paraguayan checkpoint, a brief distance from where the bus had stopped.   I very quickly learned that, as far as Paraguayan officials were concerned, I had never left Argentina; I was going to get no further into Paraguay than the checkpoint.  Despite what had been a very few minutes passing through Brazil, I learned I was missing a required exit stamp from Argentina in addition to Brazilian entry and exit stamps for my brief transit. 

The only solution was to return to Argentina by the same route and start over.  The fact that I do not recall any formalities on the trip back to Argentina through Brazil is no doubt due to the fact that, as far as officialdom was concerned, I had never left Argentina.

On the return trip to Paraguay I managed to secure in a matter of minutes all the necessary exit and entry stamps to officially leave Argentina and enter and exit Brazil minutes before presenting myself to the same attendant as previously on duty.  After detecting what I thought was a wry “well done” smile on his face, I, after producing my Paraguayan visa and a myriad of new passport stamps, was now fit to enter his country, receiving yet another stamp to add to the several I had already received that same day. 

This tri-border area, a reputed hotbed for black marketers known for its  smuggling and lax security, has been called in one government report “a lawless jungle corner of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay”.  The reported lax security seemed far from the case on October 20, 1988.  I have the hard earned passport stamps to prove it.