A 4wd vehicle is pretty mandatory if you’re planning on straying far from Asuncion.
Picking up my rental 4×4 in the airport…
- Paraguayan roads are famously awful, there’s multiple Youtube docs about this.
- I haven’t driven a manual transmission in years.
- It’s 4am, I haven’t slept. I am so tired I am unsteady.
- I’ve been sick for a week and am far from 100%.
- It’s a torrential downpour outside.
- It’s pitch black outside.
- I’ve spent pretty much zero time ever driving a diesel 4×4.
- Asuncion has basically no traffic lights and few street lights.
- I don’t see all that well.
- Since the transplants I really don’t see all that well at night.
The car rental agent is extremely nice but has left me standing alone, pondering my life choices, in a parking lot, at 4:30am, in a drenching downpour, keys in my hand, after relaying a gigantic list of instructions to me entirely in the local mix of Spanish and Guarani.
I have no idea what I am doing.
A Bit Gone 