Karen and Joel at their wedding in Paraguay. They met while serving as Peace Corps Volunteers in Paraguay. After their 2 year stint, they took a 5000 mile bike trip from Tierra del Fuego back to Paraguay to raise money for rural Paraguayan schools. Their wedding was held in the community where Joel lived for 2 years. They have since moved to Tucson, AZ where Joel will begin graduate school this fall. 
First stop in Asuncion, Paraguay: the Golden Arches! After 24 hours of travel we drove into the city center and made a pit stop for Tom and Dan to order up some burgers and fries.
Roadside fruit stand. Nearly all of the roads in Paraguay are two-lane.
Cattle (and occasional pig) crossings are common.
Memo: Wear black tops and khaki pants
In Paraguay, most bottles are super-sized. Jim and Dan liked this.
Hotel Fujimi, La Colmena. This hotel was the most rustic of the trip. Dan slept on the floor in our room. There was an electric heater for the shower.
Karen and her parents.
Bo and Karen served as Peace Corps Volunteers in Paraguay. He made the special trip for their wedding and traveled with us. His blog updates as a volunteer used to make me cry from laughing so hard. He's now a graduate student at Rutgers University.
Here is a typical bus in Paraguay. Tom, Dan and I rode one of these when we returned from Argentina to Paraguay. The bus was packed to the gills and we had to stand with our luggage. Dan experienced what it was like to travel like a local. Everyone was friendly and chatty, in Spanish, of course.
Tom delivered the wine for the reception. Soda containers were filled with wine along with this gasoline container. Joel and Karen also brought along Argentine wine for the wedding party and family... although I got to drink the local wine while on the dance floor. My Paraguayan dance partner didn't like taking beverage breaks so he'd motion for his brother to make special deliveries to us on the dance floor!
Joel's mom, Pat, is decorating for the wedding. Once we met Joel's parents it was easy to understand why Joel is such a friendly and gregarious man. 
Joel and his dad
Taking a mandarin break from the wedding preparations in Joel's village.
Joel's family and some friends prepared all of the food for the wedding. Here they are making empanadas.
Empanadas ready for the fryer.
Joel's house - he built it himself! Steve, the volunteer who performed the wedding ceremony lives here now.
The sopa, or corn bread, was made with ground up corn, water, oil, and eggs. Notice the hopeful friend by the woman's foot.
The corn bread is baking. To heat the oven they burned a bunch of wood. There were no timers, the women just know when the break is finished.
I think there were 20 or so pans of corn bread.
Taking a terere break. Terere is made from yerba, and is the traditional beverage of Paraguay and many South American countries.
Carrying the grills up the hill to Joel's village.
Doug and Dan
Thirty minutes before wedding Karen still wasn't ready yet because she was rewriting her vows...oh no! Had she changed her mind?! Karen overheard us and clarified that she was rewriting her vows so that they were legible!
A quick yogurt drink before the wedding.
Mother and daughters
Walking up the hill to the wedding
The road to Joel's village
The bride
and groom!
The 2 mothers making last minute adjustments to the flowered walkway.
The father-of-the-bride getting ready to give her away.
Exchanging vows at sunset.
I know this is blurry, but I kind of like it.
The band played Paraguayan folk music during the reception. The women in our party had a great time being asked to dance by the Paraguayan men. One guy liked me so much that he started kissing my neck until Joel peeled him away. A's dance partner kept parading her in front of his buddies to show her off.
Karen and Joel cutting a rug.
Grilling the meat - they butchered a pig and a calf for the wedding reception. Everything that wasn't eaten for the wedding was given to the family and community members who helped put on the event.
The wedding meal was served on paper plates with no utensils. A day later we all confessed that we had wiped our hands on the table cloth!
Dan was quite fond of the pork.
Euchre
Checking out of the Austria Hotel in Ciudad del Este.
Itiapu Hydroelectric Dam in Paraguay. This binational operation (Paraguay and Brazil) was created in the late 70s and it the largest of its kind in the world. The dam provides more than 90% of Paraguay's electricity and 40% of Brazil's.
The spillway
There are 20 turbines in total.
Typical city traffic in Paraguay. Tom and Joel had a ball driving in this. I had white knuckles a few times...
Every night before dinner we'd all meet for beer or wine.
Dinner at the Argentine steakhouse in Puerto Iguazu
Sisters
Argentine folk musicians
The Iguazu Falls National Park is located in Brazil and Argentina.
Joel catching the frisbee with his dad and the falls in the background. This is probably my favorite picture of the bunch. You can also see a speedboat which took Karen, Joel and Dan under the falls for a closer (and wetter) look!
Iguazu Falls
Dinner at Aqua Restaurant in Puerto Iguazu, Argentina
The photographerJim, summed it up in a toast one night at dinner when he said that Karen and Joel provided him (actually all of us) with a trip of a lifetime.
