Blogs from Florianópolis, Santa Catarina, Brazil, South America

So, we thought the Brazilian side of the falls were amazing, but we were blown away by the Argentinian side (literally, so much spray!). The falls were bigger, more impressive and we got way too snap happy! (although we waited about 15 minutes for one little lady to move out the way and she wouldnt!) We spent the day wandering the park, checking out all the viewpoints, getting a little train, sunbathing and playing with coates (like racoons, cute but very long snouts!). It was a lovely day, ending in an early night as we were checking out the following morning. The next day we sunbathed by the pool most of the day before heading to the bus station, we crossed the border easily but it then took us a while to get picked up by ... read more

Something I missed from a few days prior to this was I saw a guy get creamed on a peddle bike, he was done for, right in the middle of a busy street in Buenos Aires. He managed one last grasp and collapsed. People really need to take more care when driving or crossing streets, South American drivers are the craziest i've seen so far. The rest of the week in Buenos Aires was relaxing for me, I got into a bit of a routine in the city, knew where I liked to eat and what I liked to do there. The last night there I decided to have a few extra drinks and ended up getting risiculously drunk, this shouldn't happen in a foreign environment. I had eaten a few cheesburgers and drank a bottle ... read more

Leaving Rio was a sad day but we headed to Sau Paulo for a few nights of partying. Dilpa got to experience her first bus with us, luckily for her it was only a 6 hour ride, not too gruelling. When we arrived at our hostel we were surprised to see that not only did we have the dorm to ourselves but the whole hostel!!! Never has that happened before, it was almost like having our own little house, except for the jelly belly hostel owner of course. The hostel is co-owned by two men, one of which is a pale, chubby little thing who never seemed to wear a shirt. He used to make horrible snorting sounds aswel, he was kind of gross. Sao Paulo is a huge city but unfortunately lacks any daytime excitement. ... read more

Every holiday requires a day or two at the seaside, so again I had no choice but to relax and go with the expectation! Only choosing which beach to visit in Floripa is a bit more tricky than at home as although the island is only 33 miles long and 11 miles wide it offers no less than 42 separate beaches to visit. This means that even though there are decisions to be made, experimenting until you find the perfect one for you really is not too much of a hardship! Each part of the Island offers a very different experience; the northern part of the Ilha is very commercialised with hotels on the beachfront and crowded sands, the eastern part of the island is more peaceful and relaxed and the southern beaches are tranquil and ... read more

From the airport we arrived to our hostel, after transferring buses 3 times. Since Chloe hated the feeling of wasting a day traveling, she was adamant about having to get to the beach. So as soon as we checked in, we tossed our bags down and ran to the ocean, 5 minutes away. After an hour on the beach, Chloe´s travel anxiety was washed away and she was back to the smiling mermaid I knew. With the essential beach time out of the way, we headed to the market to pick up food for dinner. But as it was Sunday in a small beach community, there was only 1 market open with questionable meat and veggies. We picked out what we could and went back to the hostel, only to learn that we had to wait ... read more

22.10. Soooooo hungover today! The three of us (matt, savior and me) planned a trip to Florianopolis today, which is about 2 hours south of Blumenau. Savio was having a family meeting and Matt and I joined him to get to see another place in Brazil. On the way there we were all suffering terrible from last night lol I had to really concentrate at every turn to not be sick in savios nice car.. Savio invited us to join him on his family gathering, so we went to his uncles house.. there was soooo much food, about 8 cakes for dessert, it was amazing! Savios family was extremely welcoming and nice to us, loads of them actually spoke german fluently which really surprised me again.. We had a lovely afternoon eating and chatting and eating ... read more

The phenomenally big country of Brazil was on our itinery for many reasons; beautiful beaches, exciting cities... but most of all because of it's world famous Carnaval celebrations, a party not to be missed. As we were in the area at the right time of year it would've been rude not to!  The tough decision was deciding where to be for this special time. Rio was too expensive and Salvador too far to travel in the time we had. We had read about some super-clubs with world class DJs performing special Carnaval sets in southern Brazil. So with this in mind a circuitous route brought us to the Ilha de Santa Catarina, Florianopolis. A dip in fortunes and dodgy bus routes left us stranded on an empty road, knocking on doors searching for an illusive guesthouse. ... read more