El Mirador del Cerro Akati
The Akati Hill Viewpoint
What’s up, y’all!
Happy to report we survived both Christmas and New Year’s Eve. The warning about stray bullets falling from the sky was vastly exaggerated. There were a ton of fireworks, but we didn’t hear a single bit of gunfire. Sorry to disappoint you, if you were hoping to hear a tale of danger. It’s simply not dangerous here, lol.
We did get a chance to take the dogs out and go adventuring. We decided to head out to the Mirador del Cerro Akati, which translates to the “lookout point on Akati Hill”. They only have hills here, not mountains, sadly. So far, that’s been the only negative we’ve been able to find about living here - the highest point in the whole country is only about 2700 feet.
Though I’m not really complaining. 2700 feet is still higher than all of Louisiana! Not only that, but the hills are beautiful, and don’t have one bit of snow on them.😁
We’re hoping to find a place close on/near the hills, but not on a hillside. Our house in Oregon was on a hillside, and I’m not doing that again. I want something level! So we loaded up the dogs and took some backroads to get to Cerro Akati, detouring through some areas we wanted to check out.
It was a non-eventful trip, thank goodness, no stops by the police, no toll roads. We did have one thing that surprised us. Once we turned off of the highway, it was about ten miles to the top, twisting and turning, and rising in elevation the whole way.
Nothing unusual in that, a typical mountain road. What surprised us was that people lived on the road, nearly all the way to the top! There were houses and pastures in every valley, but isolated from each other. But the thing that really gets me is that there are no driveways.
Because they don’t have cars.
There’s usually only a gate large enough for a person to walk through, and a trail to the house. Sure, some of them have motorcycles, but a lot don’t even have that. I can’t imagine anyone in the United States living miles up a hill and not owning transportation to get back down. It’s a totally different mindset here, a slower way of life.
I love it.
We imagined this trip would be like driving on an Oregon fire road, with nothing but us and nature the whole way. There was a lot of nature, to be sure, but there were also people (and cows, of course😁).
However, past the houses, on the last little stretch to the top, there was no one. Well, there was one car we passed that didn’t make it to the top - do not attempt this trip if you don’t have four wheel drive! We were all by ourselves to enjoy the view.
All in all, it was a great road trip to break in “El Bandito Rojo”, the new truck. Here’s some maps to give you an idea of where we are. The first map is of Paraguay (which is in South America😜), and the red box shows you the region we’re exploring. Asunción is the capital of the country. Most people live in the eastern half of Paraguay, as the western half has brutal living conditions due to the terrain.
This next map is the red box above, zoomed in. The red circle is Piribebuy, the town we currently live in. The blue circle around it is the area we’ve explored so far. We like this area, but before we buy anything, we still want to check out the region to the east. The yellow circle is Cerro Akati, with the beautiful viewpoint. The highest point in Paraguay is on the southern end of that same range, but we’ll save that hike for another day.
You’ll notice there’s another cluster of hills to the south of us. We haven’t headed that way yet. To the south is where most of the Jesuit mission ruins are located. It’s also the part of the country that floods a lot, so while we may visit there, we’re not looking for property in that area. Maybe in the hilly part. But that’s a trip for another day.
This month, our goal is to get the truck registered, and get Paraguay driver’s licenses. Who knows, we may also hear about our residency getting approved, but not holding my breath on that one. We’re also experimenting with a way to receive packages from the US, using a courier service. We’ll see how that goes.
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Have a great week!
Parting Thoughts
Did You Know?
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I love your updates!! Miss you Girl!!
Looks like you are having an amazing adventure, I can't wait for you to find your new home and are able to have visitors, we will be scheduling a vacation, for sure.