Paraty and Ihla Grande

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Okay Parati was awesome!! It's so similar to Colonia in that it's a fairly small town with stone rock roads and beautiful beaches. I was soooo exhausted after the bs ride but I actually managed to get about 7 or 8 hours sleep on the bus which is pretty damn good going.

1st and only full day in Paraty was a tour of some re natural attractions of the area. It was a little overcast with occasional showers but the beach was really nice. By far the best part was the natural waterslide, which is essentially a huge angled rock sloping downwards in a river with lots of moss on it. It was so much fun! There were some locals going down it standing up and doing twists and moving at an incredibly fast rate! It was so dangerous I can't believe they didn't seriously damage their spine. Also went to a waterfall where you can jump of a massive rock into the water but it was so difficult to get on the rock I just changed my mind and decided against it. It was a great day though. Afterward we went to an awesome thai food restaurant that served their red curry in the shell of a pineapple - looked so amazing.

Next day we were off to Ihla Grande (large island) which is one of the most beautiful places I have been so far. We were schedule to get a public bus to the wharf and get the public ferry to ihla grande from Paraty but we opted to charter an awesome boat for about $45 brazillian reais which was the best decision ever! Was so incredibly nice and graceful and carefree. Also meant we got to stop at some awesome snorkellibg areas and spend plenty of time jumping off the boat into the beautiful greenish water. And I didn't get sunburnt at all!

We stayed at this cool tropical cottage type accomodation place in Ihla Grande for 3 nights and the best part was the hammock! I fell asleep in it for a good 2 hrs until I was woken up by Joel putting my shaving cream in my hand and when I rubbed by face right after I woke up it went all over me!! I chased after him and have him a huge forehand shaving cream slap on the face and I fell on the floor laughing! Hahaha

That night we went out for pizza and I was so hungry I ordered a grande (pretty much bigger than family size) and could only just eat half! A few people decided to share pizzas which seemed like a good idea until one of their pizzas arrived with a wood-fired cockroach resting nicely on the pizza. THey didnt even notice it until the end of the night when they were full so someone could easily have eaten it accidently!

Next day we went on the now notorious Caipirinha Boat Trip, which basically consists of drinking (very very strong) caipirinhas for free and cruising, swimming and snorkelling around this amazing island. It was an incredible day, probably one of the funniest things ive done so far. There was a huge sound system onboard aswell pumping out tunes all day which was so much fun! EVeryone went a little bit crazy when Ricky Martin came on ('un, dos, tres, olé, olé, olé!!!!´). Met some fun aussies from Melbourne on the trip and had a great time with them and the rest of the group! We then spent the our final day at Lopez Mendez, an amazing beach with proper surf waves and perfectly heated water! PLayed my first beach soccer game against the BRazillians and WON! But then we played a mix of French, Argentinian and Brazillian guys and considering they were so much better than us and ridiculously more fit I was very happy with the marginal victory they won at 5-4.

Ihla Grande then relectantly came to an end, and we made our way to Rio de Janeiro. Unfortunately for me though, because of the up and down tropical weather of Ihla Grande it took 3 days for my clothes to half dry after I washed them using liquid detergent and so for the trip to Rio i was wearing a very very very musty smelling tshirt. Everyone loved it :P

When we arrived in Rio I almost instantly fell in love with it. But Rio de Janeiro will be an entire other blog!

Merry xmas and New Years everyone!
p.s. there are no photos because i accidently put all the photos for the two last posts in the previous post, thats why there is so damn many of them!

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