Paraty, the end of the gold trail

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march 3 2006

well its the third and final day here in paraty. paraty is at the end of a gold trail that lies on the south atlantic. the portugese found gold in a state called minais gerais, about 2500km from this town. they got black slaves in from africa to build a paved road the total distance. the road rises fro sa level to about 2,5km high in the mountains and most of the trail still exists today and tours are oganised on it by companies. we didn t go on any tours of it but we did head up into the hills a little bit to find a river that flowed down from the mountains to pass paraty on its way to the ocean. we got bikes from our pousada and headed of. now i know i keep going on about it bu the heat was unreal again. it was about 6km cycle in total. but we found the river and a nice pool in which to cool down for a bit. ruth was a bit scared of the place cos apparantly they have the follwing animals in the area, anacondas(didnt see any of them), monkeys, iguanas, reptiles, snakes you know the usual jungle fare. anywho we bathed for a while and the water was oh so cold that it was beautiful. some kids arrived and started to dive in and play in it too. we headed on up the hill a bit more but we could only see a house which had a gurad dog sign on the frint so we decided to leave that one alone. probably a drug dealer we thought consiering the amount of cars that were heading up and down to the house!!!! for the rest of the day we decided to exscape the heat of the sun and retire to our air conditioned room for the rest of the day.

march 4 2006

this was our last day in paraty. ruht wanted to do some shopping so we got that done with a but of a fuss. then we headed off to the beach. our bus back to rio was at 4. then we had to catch another bus to a town called Ouro Preto. it was an over night bus so we were in no rush. we didnt do much that day just shopped a bit, sent a few postcards and then went to the beach for a bit. the bus journey to ouro preto was enjoyable if ever there was a bus journey that was enjoyable. we had executive seats that fully rclined so we could get some sleep. i was woken up though a few times. at one point i woke up to see lots of lightening happening all around the area we driving through. pretty class, the most exciting thing that happened on the journey.

march 5 2006

arrived in ouro preto and found our pousada to stay in. its right next door to the bus station. although i followed ruths directions as she had a map in her guide book, needless to say we got lost and had to head back to the place i thought it was the first time. its nice if a little basic, but it sits on a hill that overlooks the whole town pretty much. now for a little histry lesson about the town. Ouro Preto is very close to the town minais gerias that was full fo gold. around the town gold was also found so needless to say those greedy portugese wanted all of it. they used all the poor people in the area to get at it. some of the mines you can still go down and see wht used to happen (more about that in the next blog). anywho they crown used to tax the poor people on al the gold they found. about 1/5 of the the amount they had. there were points set up on the road so that they would not escape the taxman. but as the gold dried up the taxes went up also so thye found it harder and harder to make a living out of the gold. so in the late 1700´s a few hardy men decided to have a rebellioen in the area against the crown of portugal. but it failed and they were all caught. one of the men was called Tridantes as he was brought to rio where he was hung drawn and quartered and his bits and bobs sent to the area to remind everyone of their fate if they tried anything like that again. the rebellious people, were either sent to jail in portugal or to portugese colonies in africa to work. some were even priests. anywho in 1942 a grand house with a mueseum was built to honour them and their cause and they were redeemed by the president of Brazil at the tme a man called vargas. so there you go. i could bore you with more details but i´ll do that when i home.


so there you go all up to date and all that jazz. please e-mail me if you can to keep me sane. burger1979Gmail.com

i´ll try to upload pics in the next few days or so, of the places we have been and such. until the next time same bat time, same bat channel, keep it cool kids.

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