We spent a few days in the city of Cascavel and are now back on the road. But not in the direction of Argentina, as originally planned, and also not in the direction of Santa Catarina and the Brazilian Atlantic coast, as also planned. We have completely changed our plans. The Pantanal lures us, but for that we have to go north and forego Argentina for the time being. We intend to catch up on that from Bolivia.

For the trip to the Pantanal we cross the province of Paraná – eponymous with the river. The land is flat and we see almost exclusively corn fields and cattle pastures as well as huge silos, to which several trucks turn.

The fences on both sides of the road make it difficult to find a suitable wild camping spot. The sun is about to set when we stand in front of the entrance gate of a cattle ranch. A farmer looks at us sullenly when he comes through the gate later, but leaves us in peace.

A brief, glorious sunset can be seen over the undulating land and the Milky Way spreads out above us in the moonless night. The sunrise is also impressive and I let our drone circle for the first time. We head to the Paraná River.