Salvador, Sao Paulo, Foz Do Igaucu

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Pulling up to the ferry port on front of the Mercado Modelo was definitely the most scenic way to arrive to Bahia's capital, Salvador. Myself and my travel companions, Mary and Till, said our farewells to our tour group, CruzTheCoast, that we had travelled north from Rio de Janeiro with, and made our way to our hostel for the next four days, Galeiria 13. We were greeted with smiles and an abundance of information from the very friendly, sincere owner, Paulo. After our 11 days of constant packing and unpacking, Salvador’s only hostel with a pool was a welcome break. I couldn’t rave enough about this hostel, with the excellent internet access, a huge breakfast spread (with eggs on request) and the moroccan themed tv and lounge room, it gave us little reason to go exploring.

Our days in Salvador were filled with catching up on postcards, wandering the historic Pelourinho area and stumbling across the pre-carnival practicing samba percussion bands. The Pelourinho’s streets are cobbled and lined with brightly painted Portuguese colonial mansions. The most spectacular building is the Igrejae Convento de Sao Francisco, a Franciscan church, which was originally a temple to the wealth of the rich sugar cane barons. Initially our plan was to spend carnival in Salvador, but due to money constraints we couldn’t afford to spend three extra weeks in Bahia. Luckily, on one of our last nights, we stumbled upon a carnival pre-party with a huge stage and one of the headlining acts for the actual 2012 carnival parade. Feeling satisfied that we experienced some true Bahian culture, we booked a last minute flight to Brazil’s most populated city, the concrete jungle, Sao Paulo.

A quick two hour flight saw arrive early morning to Sao Paolo’s Guarulhos airport. We quickly adjusted to the city’s vey modern Metro system, navigating ourselves to the Paraiso station and arrived at our hostel before 10am. After travelling overnight, we decided to take the first day off and relax. The following morning, we woke early and headed to the city centre to meet a friend of mine, Flavio, at the Edificio Allino Arantes. This building imitates New York’s Empire State Building and has an open-air observation platform from where we had a panoramic view of concrete building as far as the horizon (a view I have never experienced before in comparison). We stopped off at the nearby Mercado Municipal food market, which resides in a huge open plan hall and where you can find the freshest nuts, cheese’s, fruits, vegetables and meats in the city.

The afternoon brought us to the renowned Cathedral Da Se, located in the city’s largest public square, Praca de Se. Its sheer shape (14 spires) and size (97m high), makes it one of the most impressive and distinguishable buildings in this vast city. That night we immersed ourselves into the Paulista nightlife. We arrived at the famous Rua Augusta, at an early 10pm, to see the streets packed with other 20-30 year olds. I didn’t fully grasp the size of this street until we passed over 80 bars on either side, with music blaring out onto the street to suit any type of genre. The variety of bars inevitably meant we crossed the threshold of our hostel door late the following morning, heading straight to bed for the day.

Our final day in SP was a Sunday which, in this city, is the best day for markets. We strolled through Chinatown, sampling cuisine and admiring differences in the street decor. We then turned onto the city’s main street, Avenida Paulista, a multi-lane urban highway, dotted with skyscrapers and retail stores. With little time left we quickly browsed through the antique markets, said our farewells to Flavio and Sao Paulo and made our way to the bus station. Our next stop was to the city of Foz Do Iguacu.

This was our first overnight bus of the trip and at 22 hours long, was not the most enjoyable experience. Even with reclinable seats, foot rests and an onboard toilet, nothing beats an immobile bed. On arrival to the bus station at Foz Do Iguacu, we located a tourist information office, who point blank refused to locate our hostel, Hostel Supernova, due to tax complications on the hostels part. So we apprehensively hailed a taxi and repeated our request. Without hesitation, the driver took us to the hostel which seemed as respectable as any other we had stayed in on our travels. We quickly dropped our bags and hopped onto the local bus to see the Brazilian side of the famed waterfalls.

This was definitely one of the ‘WOW’ moments of my trip. Standing before the worlds grandest waterfalls in 38 degrees heat, with rainbows intertwining within them, was absolutely amazing. Entrance to the park was an equivalent 17 Euro, and you have to walk a pedestrian route with many vantage points leading up to the main attraction (also encountering animals like inquisitive racoon-like Coatimundis). One negative of the falls, like the Corcovado in Rio, was the amount of tourists, meaning you only have a few precious moments at every photographic opportunity before being nudged along by tour groups full of old Chilean couples. We spent the next two nights relaxing at our tax-dodging hostel's pool and hammock area. We agreed against the Argentinian side view of the falls due to a combination of laziness and hassle of border control. Early Friday morning saw us back at the bus station boarding a bus to our next country and adventure, Argentina...

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