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Paraguay: The green heart of South America: tereré in the shade, the majestic Jesuit Missions, the wild Chaco and a Guaraní hospitality that makes you feel right at home.
Paraguay is the country almost everyone crossing South America skips, and that is the best reason to go. It sits landlocked in the middle of the continent, wedged between Argentina, Brazil and Bolivia, roughly the size of California. There is no coastline, no single headline sight, and almost no international tourism industry — so what it does have, you tend to have to yourself: the best-preserved Jesuit mission ruins on the continent, one of the largest dams on earth, half a country of near-empty wilderness, and a culture that is genuinely bilingual in Spanish and Guaraní, an Indigenous language spoken by the great majority of the population, cities included. It is also one of the cheapest countries in South America.
It is easy to cover, with four axes: Asunción and its metropolitan area, with lakeside towns such as Areguá and San Bernardino on Lake Ypacaraí; the south and the Jesuit missions around Encarnación, Trinidad and Jesús de Tavarangué; the east and the triple frontier, with Ciudad del Este and the Itaipú dam; and the vast Gran Chaco to the northwest, one of the wildest and least populated regions on the continent. Almost everything happens by long-distance bus, comfortable and very cheap, because domestic flights barely exist. Geographically Paraguay is the missing link between three places probably already on your list: Iguazú Falls are on its eastern doorstep, Buenos Aires is a short flight or an overnight bus south, and the Brazilian Pantanal lies across the northern border. Adding it to a regional trip costs three or four days and very little money.
What travellers take home is the sense of having found somewhere genuinely untouristed and inexpensive, where nobody is trying to sell them anything. What surprises them is how underexploited the heritage is: the mission ruins are UNESCO World Heritage and you can often walk them almost alone, which is unthinkable at the equivalent sites in Argentina or Brazil. What catches people out is the heat — summer here is punishing — and how little English is spoken once you leave the hotel lobby.
The currency is the guaraní (PYG, symbol ₲). Notes carry large figures, so keep an eye on the zeros when you pay. Traveler tip: it's best to bring US dollars or euros in cash and change them at exchange offices in downtown Asunción or Ciudad del Este (they usually offer better rates than the airport). Cards are accepted in hotels and large stores, but for markets, buses and small towns always keep cash in guaraníes.
Full converter for PYG →The main gateway is Silvio Pettirossi International Airport (ASU), in Luque, a few kilometers from Asunción. In the east, Guaraní International Airport (AGT), near Ciudad del Este, handles regional flights and is handy if you're heading to the Iguazú Falls or Foz do Iguaçu. International connections usually go through Buenos Aires, São Paulo, Santiago, Lima or Panama. Airlines flying to the country include Paranair (the main Paraguayan flag carrier), plus LATAM, Gol, Aerolíneas Argentinas and Copa Airlines, among others. Domestic flights are limited: Paranair links Asunción with Ciudad del Este and a couple of other points, but for most journeys within the country the bus is the way to go. The long-distance coach is king of domestic transport: comfortable, cheap and with frequent services from Asunción's Bus Terminal to the whole country and neighboring nations (Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia). Cities have urban buses and, to get around comfortably, you can use taxis or apps like Bolt and Uber in Asunción. For rural areas or the Chaco, renting a vehicle (ideally high-clearance) gives you far more freedom.
Paraguay is subtropical and one factor decides everything: heat. This is the southern hemisphere, so the seasons are reversed from North America and Europe — summer runs December to February and is very hot and humid, frequently above 38–40 °C (100–104 °F), especially in the Chaco, which makes daytime sightseeing genuinely unpleasant. The best time to visit is autumn and winter, May to September, when the weather is cooler, drier and comfortable for walking the ruins, the cities and the countryside. In practice the northern-hemisphere summer holidays are the ideal window: July here is midwinter.
Even in winter the days are usually mild and sunny, though cold fronts push up from the south and bring genuinely chilly spells, so pack a layer rather than assuming the tropics. Spring (September to November) is also pleasant, with flowering trees and agreeable weather. If your plan involves the river beaches at Encarnación or the carnival, summer is the season, but be ready for the heat and plan around the middle of the day. One date worth knowing: the pilgrimage to Caacupé on 8 December is the country's largest religious festival, when hundreds of thousands walk to the basilica — spectacular to witness, and worth avoiding if you just want a clear road.
Paraguayan cooking is built on corn, cassava and cheese. Try sopa paraguaya first, which despite the name is not a soup at all — it is a dense, spongy savoury cornbread baked with cheese and onion, and Paraguayans enjoy explaining the misnomer. Then chipa, a chewy cheese bread made from cassava starch and sold on every street corner and every long-distance bus; chipa guasú, a softer corn-and-cheese bake; vori vori, a broth with cornmeal dumplings; and mbejú, a cassava-and-cheese griddle cake. This is cattle country, so beef and the wood-fired asado are central, and boiled mandioca — the root known elsewhere as cassava or yuca — comes with almost everything, the way bread or potatoes would at home.
It is one of the cheapest places in the region to eat: lunch at a market or a neighbourhood comedor costs 3 to 8 USD, and dinner at a mid-range restaurant 10 to 20 USD (verified July 2026). The national drink is tereré, cold mate infused with herbs, drunk at all hours against the heat; also worth trying are caña, the local sugarcane spirit, and very cold beer, the default social drink. Mercado 4 in Asunción is the best single place to eat through all of it cheaply. Portions are large and vegetables are an afterthought, but vegetarians will find the corn-and-cheese half of the menu covers them better than the meat half suggests.
Paraguay is generally a calm, safe country to travel in, with an unhurried rhythm and famously hospitable people. The realistic risk is petty crime — pickpocketing and bag-snatching — in crowded places such as Mercado 4 in Asunción or the commercial crush of Ciudad del Este, so keep your belongings close and your phone out of sight. As anywhere in the region, use ride-hailing apps at night (Bolt and Uber both work in Asunción), avoid poorly lit areas after dark and do not display valuables. The northern border area and some rural parts of the Chaco call for more caution, but sit well outside the usual tourist routes. Traffic is the underrated hazard: driving is on the right, lane discipline is loose and motorbikes come from everywhere.
No vaccination is required to enter, but yellow fever cover is recommended if you are heading to the Chaco or rural areas, and dengue is present, mainly in summer, so use repellent. Tap water in Asunción is chlorinated, but travellers are better off with bottled water, particularly outside the capital. The heat is what to take seriously: drink far more than you think you need and stay out of the midday sun in summer. Take out travel insurance — private clinics in Asunción are decent and inexpensive by North American or European standards, but no foreign health plan covers you here and evacuation from the Chaco would be costly. Emergency numbers are 911 (police), 132 (fire) and 141 (ambulance, SEME) (verified July 2026).
Paraguay is one of the cheapest countries in South America, noticeably less expensive than Argentina, Brazil or Uruguay, which makes it a genuine relief if you are travelling the continent on a budget. A backpacker gets by on around 25 to 40 USD a day, and 45 to 70 USD buys a comfortable mid-range trip (verified July 2026). With no real domestic flight network, the long-distance bus is the workhorse of the country and costs very little, so internal transport barely registers in a budget.
For reference (July 2026): a hostel dorm bed costs 8 to 15 USD and a simple private room 20 to 40 USD; a local lunch 3 to 8 USD; dinner at a mid-range restaurant 10 to 20 USD; a city bus in Asunción about 0.50 USD; and long-distance coaches are cheap — Asunción to Encarnación is around 8 to 12 USD. The currency is the guaraní, which runs to large numbers, so count the zeros when you pay. Bring US dollars or euros in cash and change them at the exchange houses in central Asunción or Ciudad del Este, which give better rates than the airport. Cards work in hotels and larger shops, but markets, buses and small towns are cash-only, so always keep guaraníes on you.
This is the part of Paraguay with no equivalent anywhere else in the Americas. Guaraní is co-official alongside Spanish, and the status is not ceremonial: the great majority of the population actually speaks it, in Asunción as much as in the countryside, at home, at work and on the radio. It is the only Indigenous language on the continent with that kind of everyday, cross-class, urban presence. Much of what you overhear will be jopara, the constant mixing of Guaraní and Spanish within the same sentence, which is why your Spanish can suddenly stop making sense mid-conversation. You will manage fine in Spanish; English gets you very little beyond hotels and a few tour operators, considerably less than in Argentina or Brazil. Learning a word or two of Guaraní — mbaéichapa, how are you — earns disproportionate goodwill.
Practical details: power is 220 V, 50 Hz with type C sockets, the European two-round-pin plug, so North American, British, Irish and Australian devices all need an adapter, and anything not rated for dual voltage needs a converter too (phone and laptop chargers almost always are; hairdryers usually are not). Connectivity is good in the cities: buy a prepaid SIM from Tigo, Personal or Claro with your passport, or use an eSIM. Driving is on the right. A tip from experience: adapt to the country's pace instead of fighting it, because the midday siesta is real and widely observed, with shops in smaller towns closing for hours. And do not underestimate the summer heat — it dictates what time of day it makes sense to move at all.
The history of Paraguay is that of a landlocked, Guaraní-speaking and deeply resilient country, forged in the heart of South America between the Paraguay and Paraná rivers. Shut off from the sea yet crossed by one of the continent's greatest river networks, it was the cradle of the famous experiment of the Jesuit-Guaraní missions, the land of the first revolution to declare independence from the Spanish Crown in the Southern Cone —in May 1811— and the setting of the most devastating war in South American history, the War of the Triple Alliance (1864-1870), which came close to erasing the nation from the map. No other American country has gone through a comparable experience of near extermination and rebirth.
From that catastrophe, Paraguay rose again. It slowly rebuilt its population and its economy, fought and largely won the Chaco War against Bolivia (1932-1935), and then lived through the long dictatorship of Alfredo Stroessner (1954-1989), the longest in 20th-century South America. Since 1989 it has lived under a still young democracy, sustained by the energy of Itaipú and by a powerful agro-export boom in soy and beef.
Read the full history of Paraguay →Pick a region and open each destination to see what to do, prices and how to get there.
These are the sources we cite most across this country's guides, with how many times each appears. Hard data —tickets, opening hours, requirements, transport— comes from the official source and carries the date we checked it. Restaurant and hotel picks come from guides and reviews, and we say so on each page.
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