Moconá Waterfalls
Saltos del Moconá
Interesting facts
- The falls exist because of a narrow trench in the riverbed, cut during the last glacial period when a drier climate kept the Uruguay River much narrower.
- Along the falls the submerged trench is only about 30 metres wide but is estimated to be roughly 90 to 120 metres deep.
- If waterfalls broken up by islands are left out, Moconá is sometimes ranked the second-widest waterfall on Earth, after Iguazu.
- Argentina's 1993 law protecting the falls bans any construction that would alter the scenery, allowing only minor works such as walkways and jetties.
- In 2015 a Brazilian federal court halted licensing of the planned Panambí dam because its reservoir would have flooded part of Turvo State Park.
- Turvo State Park on the Brazilian bank began as a forest reserve in 1947 and was one of the first protected areas in Rio Grande do Sul.
- Turvo shelters the last large tract of Upper Uruguay forest in its state, with more than 700 plant species and nearly 290 bird species.
- The rocky riverbanks near the falls are one of the few homes of Dyckia brevifolia, an endemic bromeliad at risk of extinction.
- Tourism promoters in Rio Grande do Sul have counted the Yucumã Falls among the seven wonders of the Brazilian state.
Why it is worth it
Most waterfalls cross a river; the Moconá Falls run along it. On the border between Argentina and Brazil, the Uruguay River drops into a long fault that splits its bed lengthwise, so that the water pours sideways off one half of the riverbed into a deep channel beside it, forming a curtain of falls stretching for well over a kilometre and a half. On the Brazilian side they are called the Salto do Yucumã, and they are often described as the longest longitudinal waterfall in the world.
The drops themselves are modest, generally between about 5 and 10 metres, and their appearance depends on the river: the falls only show when the Uruguay is running low, and at high water the river swallows them entirely. The name suits that habit. In Guaraní, Moconá is usually translated as "the one that swallows everything", while Yucumã is said to mean "great fall". Because the international border follows the deepest channel of the river, almost all of the falls lie on the Argentine side, although the Brazilian bank gives a broad view of the water spilling into the basalt cleft. The surroundings are dense subtropical forest on rugged, river-cut ground, protected on the Argentine side by Moconá Provincial Park within the Yabotí Biosphere Reserve, and on the Brazilian side by Turvo State Park.
Protection came in stages. A reserve was created in 1967 after the landowner Juan Alberto Harriet donated the 999 hectares around the falls; the provincial park followed in 1988, and in 1993 Argentina declared the stretch of the Uruguay between the mouths of the Yabotí stream and the Pepirí Guazú River a national natural monument. That status mattered: in the 1970s a dam project at Roncador would have drowned the falls under a reservoir, and it was later abandoned, partly because of its cost to the landscape.
Getting there
The falls lie in San Pedro Department, Misiones Province, Argentina, on the border with Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. On the Argentine side the nearest town is El Soberbio, about 35 km away, reached from Posadas (about 337 km by road) via provincial roads along the Uruguay River. On the Brazilian side the town of Derrubadas lies about 20 km away. The nearest Argentine airport is Cataratas del Iguazú International Airport (IGR), about 166 km away in a straight line.
On these lists
-27.14306, -53.88667per Wikidata