Paraty - Waterfalls and Boat trips...

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I have now made it to the small historic town of Paraty . We arrived via bus from the Angra dos Reis port after getting the boat back from Ilha Grande on much calmer waters. Our first impressions of the place were good with the cobbled streets and little shops along the sides, we found our hotel, dumped our bags and immediately headed to a waterfall called Cachoeira da Pedra Branca where you can slide/surf down if your brave enough! A lot of the locals fly down on their feet basically surfing the rock all the way down to the pool at the bottom, when we arrived there were some young locals surfing down the rock face and it looked impressive and quite easy I must say so the majority of us thought we would give it a go starting by sliding on our backsides to the bottom...that all went fine and was good fun so us lads (me, Rob and Ian) thought we would try the surfing version starting with a run up and attempting to get to the bottom without falling over. Much to the amusement of the locals we all managed around 3 seconds before slipping and dramatically falling on to the rock and spinning around as we hit the pool at the bottom. Ian did give it a few more goes and proved the best of our bunch standing for a fair while before slamming onto the rock so the gold medal goes to him...just a few bruises and scrapes for the rest of us! The German guy on our trip Uwe tried sliding down from the top sitting down and we were at the bottom so I thought that I would film the slide from start to finish, it took him a while to get moving down the slide...then a bit longer...and a bit longer before being at a standstill shouting ‘I can’t move’ so at that point I thought the video may not be too interesting seeing as it would be around 15 minutes long...he eventually made it to the bottom without making a splash due to the pace and probably more of a plop like dropping a pebble into a pond.

After all this excitement we decided to head back to the top to a waterfall and get a few photo’s including a group photo, we all successfully navigated ourselves in as the surface felt like you were walking on grease it was so slippery , we then had a group photo which was nice...as we all started to make our way out of the waterfall I turned round to see Uwe slip and smash into the rock nose first looking like he had took a hayemaker off David Haye...everyone was in a bit of shock and helped him out of the water with his nose looking well and truly broken, the guy didn’t even seem bothered and just took it in his stride (all I know is if that was me the eyes would of been streaming and panic would probably set in...but not this chap!) we all got our stuff together to send Uwe to the hospital. The rest of us all headed back to the town and had a wonder of the streets that have a great feel about them with little bars playing music and outdoor seating, before heading out for food and trying some more Brazilian dishes...yumm.

The next day me and Anna agreed to get up early for a run which we did, was a lovely run through the streets and to a small beach close by, although after just rolling out of bed then going straight out for a run meant I was running with my eyes half shut, just about got through it without falling over! We then had a boat tour sorted which was basically a booze cruise with some snorkelling chucked in (result!!). Uwe had returned and luckly he hadn’t broken his nose although at the time I couldn’t see any other outcome, just a few stitches and a couple of black eyes emerging, as he wouldn’t be able to go in the water he didn’t come on the boat with the rest of us. The tour was 70reals which is for 5hrs stopping at various beaches, food included as well as all you can drink Caipirinha’s...!! The sun was out when we left , the music pumping on the boat and everyone was loving it, we stopped at our first beach and everyone jumped in off the boat towards the shore with bomb shells proving to be the best way in. We then got back on the boat and the drinks started flowing, after a further hour it started to cloud over a bit but that didn’t dampen anyone’s spirits with all the blokes continually jumping off the top deck trying to splash everyone while the girls filmed and gossiped on board. The music was so random you would literally have R&B followed by some metal then some Brazilian music for example, strange but good times! The boat got back in late afternoon and we all made our way to the hotel, with a few a bit worse for wear and some shocking singing along the way, we then went out for a really nice meal then a few of us stayed out for a drink in a local bar with some live music....great way to finish the day although the 10reals extra cost to the bill just because there was a guy with a guitar was a bit steep I thought.

Some great laughs in Paraty and a really nice old and traditional town, now time for my first nightbus to Foz de Iguassu to see the mighty Iguassu falls.

Take care, speak soon..

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