Authentic community tourism: 20 families who are guardians of the most intimate Iberá and the Guazú-Cuaré Nature Reserve.
82 km from Mercedes and 32 km from Colonia Carlos Pellegrini via RP40.
Uguay, which in Guaraní means "watery depths" or "little corner," is a remote Corrientes settlement where around 20 families live inside the Iberá Nature Reserve. The traditional landscape features espinillo and ñandubay trees that shade the cattle of small-scale ranchers.
The settlement has a lodge with access to Laguna Fernández, where you can stay overnight.
Activities: boating on Laguna Fernández, flora and wildlife watching, walks along nature trails, horseback rides through the settlement and visits to artisans.
How to get there
From Mercedes (82 km) via RP 40. From Carlos Pellegrini (32 km) via RP 40 (the nearest hub with the most lodging options).
What to do
- 🛶 Boating on Laguna Fernández
- 🦜 Flora and wildlife watching
- 🥾 Walks along nature trails
- 🐴 Horseback rides with local guides
- 🧵 Visit to local artisans
What to see in Paraje Uguay
- 🦌 Guazú-Cuaré Nature Reserve
- 🛶 Laguna Fernández by canoe
- 🧵 Local artisans
- 🐴 Horseback rides with local guides
Wildlife you will see
- 🐦 Yellow cardinal
- Capybara
- Maned Wolf
- Marsh Deer
- Heron
- Lagoon wildlife
Where to sleep and eat
Posada Uguay with overnight stays available (book 1 to 2 days ahead). Additional option in Carlos Pellegrini (32 km), with more lodging choices.
Traditional local recipes shared by the staff of Posada Uguay.
Featured places to stay
- Rincón del Socorro
An experience hotel in a historic 1896 estancia, founded by Douglas Tompkins as part of the Iberá rewilding project. Access to the National Park with reintroduced wildlife: giant anteater, pampas deer, peccaries and more.★ 4.8 - Posada Uguay
Exclusive lodge inside the Guasú-kua Private Nature Reserve: 60 hectares of native woodland, grassland and wetland shore. Five en-suite rooms, a pool, a covered grill, a private jetty with exclusive access to Laguna Fernández and a lookout tower. Regional cooking. Activities: boat, horseback riding, hiking, night safaris, kayak.★ 4.8 - Iberá Estero Salvaje
Rural lodging with 3 en-suite rooms, regional meals and exclusive access to Laguna Fernández. Boat excursions, photo safari, horseback riding and hiking with a naturalist guide. Run by Claudia and Pedro.★ 4.8
Best time to visit
April to October. The May and June sunrises, with low fog over the lagoon, are especially photogenic. The yellow cardinal is best spotted in the dry season.
The portal in photos
Portal Uguay: twenty families guarding the most intimate Iberá
Uguay means "bottom with water", or "little corner", in Guaraní. The name describes the hamlet well: a remote spot where around twenty families have lived for generations inside the Iberá Nature Reserve, caring for the wetland with the same knowledge their ancestors inhabited it with. There is no mass tourism here, no hotel chains, no sophisticated infrastructure. There is a Posada Uguay with its own canoe for sailing Laguna Fernández, artisans from the hamlet, and baqueanos who know every palm grove and every ford in the surroundings.
Portal Uguay is 82 km from Mercedes and 32 km from Carlos Pellegrini along RP 40, which allows it to be combined with a visit to Portal Laguna Iberá. The usual pattern is two nights in Pellegrini, one night in Uguay, and back to Mercedes. Posada Uguay requires booking one to two days ahead: it is a small family enterprise and has no capacity for groups of more than eight to ten people at once.
Laguna Fernández, sailed by canoe from the inn, is different from the great lagoons of the system: more intimate, with more emergent vegetation and with wildlife that includes the Yellow Cardinal (one of the most photographed in the Iberá) and the maned wolf. The dawns of May and June, when the mist settles over the water, are photographically unique. The women artisans of the hamlet work with materials from the native woodland: weaving, hats and objects made with techniques passed down from generation to generation.
Community tourism in the Iberá
Portal Uguay is the purest case of community tourism in the Iberá system. There is no outside company managing the excursions: it is the families of the hamlet who guide, cook, host and make the crafts. The money from tourism goes straight to the communities that guard the reserve. Visiting Uguay is also a way of sustaining that model.
Other portals of the Iberá
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