Florianopolis


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Published: June 10th 2010
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Hello again,

After realising our plans of traveling to the northeast coast of Brazil and making our way south towards Rio were a bit more expensive/ambitious than we could enjoyably handle we decided to fly from Manaus (where we ended our boat trip) all the way to the south of Brazil to a place called Florianopolis. After a 1 hour stop over in Rio we continued on to Florianopolis by plane and after catching a taxi at the airport we quickly realised we had entered an entirely different climate from the Amazon, to say the least. It is winter in Brazil right now so the south sees cooler temperatures, much less humidity, and the day we arrived at least- rain. The staff at the hostel informed us that the past week had been very wet but assured us that the next week's forecast looked promising. So, for our first day we just relaxed in the hostel, met some people and caught up on sleep which we didn't get much over on our red-eye flight from Manaus. Florianopolis is the largest city on Ilha Santa Catarina and our hostel was located near the shore of Lagoa da Conceicao which is a really cool lake on the island. If you have some time, check out a map of the island- super cool because it kind of has the best of both worlds: coastal beaches plus inland lake. We stayed here for quite a while so I'll split the blog up into sections based on where we went/what we did.

Praia da Joaquina:

Our first beach was Joaquina which you reach either by bus (boring) or by a 1 hour walk from our hostel, 45mins of which is over these huge sand dunes which separate the edge of the southern part of the lake from the coastal beach. This was a really cool walk and as you can see from the pictures, we had the entire dune area to ourself pretty much aside from some people sand-boarding at one specific location. The beach itself was quite nice but had a pretty strong wind so it was a bit chilly. There actually was a junior surf competition finishing up that morning that we caught a quick glimpse of which was cool. We hiked back through the dunes and walked along the lake shore back to the hostel.

Pacha Night Club:

For our Saturday night out the hostel arranged a bus to take people to and from the biggest night club in Florianopolis called Pacha. Little did we know until tonight but Pacha apparently is one of the biggest night club chains in the world. It started in Ibiza, Spain, and now has locations in many of the big cities in the world (New York, Buenos Aires, London, Moscow, etc.). Although as many of you know, Laura and I are not really the club type, however we still had a great time as nearly all of the hostel guests came out along with a good number of the staff. The place was absolutely packed with people however it being winter a lot of the outdoor space was left empty (it's quite cool at night). Apparently in the summer the entire facility can fit close to 3000 people. Our bus picked us up at 4:30am which by Canadian standards is quite a late night however for the Brazilians I guess we were light-weights: the club closed at 7:00am.

Praia Mole:
We spent the day after the club plus the following day and our last day at the beautiful Mole beach. This is considered by many people to have Ilha Santa Catarina's best surf and recently hosted a pro surf competition at the end of May. The waves were absolutely huge and there were many surfers out in the water both days. Add to that perfect white sand plus cloudless skys and you'll understand why we absolutely loved this beach. We both went in the water here and played in the waves (the water was a bit cool but nice after the initial shock) and really got an appreciation for powerful surf. It was absolutely exhausting to try and swim out past the shallow portion of the waves- they would just keep pushing you into shore no matter how hard you tried! Our second day at Mole I brought one of the hostel's surfboards along to give surfing another shot after Peru but don't be fooled by the picture, my attempt only last 5mins. After beginning to paddle out into the water and trying to get past that first section of waves (in order to get to the surfable waves beyond them), getting flipped over and tossed off the board repeatedly I gave up. It turns out that a beach good enough to host a pro surf contest ISN'T the best place for a beginner with 3 days of surf experience. Who would have thought? My body boarding attempt went a bit better but still didn't last long after being bounced off the sand numerous times. Even swimming in the waves was absolutely exhausting but still tons of fun!

Praia da Lagoinha do leste:

At the recommendation of one of the hostel owners, a group of 6 of us from the hostel headed south to check out the most remote beach on the island. After being dropped off by our driver we hiked from about 1hr and 15mins first up through the forest/jungle and then down towards the beach. The hike was a bit more demanding than we had expected but luckily Laura and I had opted to wear shoes (half the group wore flip-flops and payed for it dearly). We also brought along the hostel dog for the day, Duna, who served as our guide for the hike! There really was only one path but Duna knew the way from past visits to this spot. As you can see from the pictures the beach was beautiful. We essentially were the only people there aside from a few surfers who hiked out shortly after our arrival when the waves calmed down. Overall a really cool spot. Not as nice of sand as Mole, but the isolation of the beach made it feel very unique. Our hike back out went a bit quicker than on the way in and we then headed back to the hostel.

Praia da Barra da Lagoa:

This beach was in front of a large fishing community that also had a canal running along the edge of it which connects the lake to the ocean. During the winter months this beach (along with some others on the island) is actually closed to surfing to allow the community the best opportunity to fish for mullet. Much of the beach was wet from the high tide so we just chilled out on the boardwalk and then watched the different fishing activities going on near us. In the canal, fisherman would stand on the rocks and wait to see fish before throwing a huge net into the water, quickly retrieving it and checking to see if they caught anything. We were only lucky enough to see the men throw their nets once but one guy ended up getting 3 fish. It didn't seem like the most precise practice to say the least, but it seemed to be the standard method. A large fishing boat came into shore just before we were leaving which was absolutely loaded with fish from a huge net that was cast much farther out in the ocean. A group of about 30 men then worked to untangle the net, separate the fish from the net and then began to cook some up for lunch!

Our hostel: Tucano House Backpackers

We usually don't mention our hostel on here but this one definitely deserves it! It is run by a brother-sister combo from Florianopolis who took over their parents former home and instead of splitting it up or selling it decided to do some major renovations and then turn it into a hostel. Laura and I both agreed that this is the best backpackers hostel that we stayed at our entire trip. BY FAR the best staff of any hostel, great atmosphere (something about this place just makes everyone hang out together which sounds simple, but trust us, it doesn't happen at every hostel), great breakfast, pool, big common kitchen, amazing cheap prepared dinners 6 nights a week, great dog, etc., etc., etc. If you are reading this while researching a trip to Florianopolis, stay here, period.


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