Oi! I am writing to you from Paraty, a beautiful British Colonial town just three and a half hours bus ride West of Rio. (The t in Paraty is pronounced like a tc, so pronounced Paratchy). We arrived here last night at about 7pm. But I have skipped a couple of days, so here is what we have been up to : On Thursday 4th I embarked upon a Favela Tour with Marcelo Armstrongs company. The tour was excellent. I felt shocked in two very different ways: the poverty and hardship some face in terms of working themselves and their families out of the favela is horrible, but the standard of living is much better than i thought it would be. The tour lasted three hours and we visited two favelas: Rocinha (biggest Favela in Rio) ... read more

Some photos so far. More to follow. Love S xx... read more

Hi all, So we are back in Rio this evening. Today I went with a new traveller we met around Buzios´ many beaches on a bike. It. Was. Hilly. Such a good workout though! Need to work off all this gorgeous Brazilian food i am eating. We got lunch for 10 Reals, which is about 3.20 pounds. Bargain. Generally things are cheapish here, but we are in Rio which is much more expensive that other places we will go. So we biked around the main beaches for about 5 hours. In the summer (on season) Buzios will be heaving with tourists and middle class Brazilians. The town itself is pretty and the shops are very chic. Travelling off-season is nice because even though the weather isnt as good it is much less crowded and much cheaper. ... read more

Hi, Quick update. Yesterday I bought some Havianas, amazing flip flops, white with butterflies on them. Cute. In the evening we met up with some of Davids old tour group (who he explored bolivia, peru etc with) and we went out in Lapa, which is an area of Rio that is filled (in the evenings) with small exotic food and drinks stalls. Everyone dresses up and chills out, normally with some loud pumping brazilian music playing. We relaxed for a bit, wandered round the stalls, and ended up in a small building which almost looked like a warehouse. There was an African band playing, with about 15 drums of different sizes, a conductor with his own snare drum, two singers and about 3 dancers on stage. The beats the drums produced were amazing, and the crowd ... read more