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Published: March 7th 2008
Ilha Grande
walking to dois rios.. G’day people.. It has been a little while, we missed you…really, we did, and I know that you missed us too! Well, here we are going to finish off updating you on Brasil because we are now in Argentina and have been for about a week or so… love Argentina by the way, we’ve already decided that we have to come back and spend a couple of months here when we can, not sure when that will be but… we’ll make it happen! ..although something that concerns me.. men kiss each other here, not on the lips but usually on both cheeks to greet each other… not sure if I could adapt!?!
Anyway, after Buzios we spent 5 nights in Ilha Grande (Big Island, not a hard one to translate!), which we already visited on our tour for a few days prior, we liked it so much, obviously, so we thought we’d come back!
, this time the weather was much kinder to us and we had sunny days for most! Although we did have one of the most impressive electrical storms that I have ever seen, at night, we had a few overnight whilst on the island - perfect time for them! Uncle Nigel would have loved it. It lasted a good few hours and every few seconds the sky would light up with fork lightening, it even joined other forks in the sky rather then touching the ground - really cool. I even educated Sarah on the fact that thunder is actually the noise lightening creates, she didn’t believe me so I had to google it for her!
Whilst on the island we were quite active. We did a nice walk thru sub jungle terrain, kind of like rain forest to get to a nice beach on the other side of the Island, Lopez Mendes, we actually did this walk when we were last here, but this time walked all the way, about 2.5 hours… unfortunately no waves on this visit so we just relaxed, swam and had a little picnic. We caught a boat back and saved the legs… as we were coming in to the main port we came across a few pods of dolphins… so we spent about an hour following them as they played about for us… we managed to get some good Ilha Grande
speed boat tour... travelling in style pics and videos!
On another day we splashed out and took a speedboat tour around the island.. It’s the only way to see it all in one day. The boat was a 23ft luxury fit pleasure craft that comfortably held about 12 people, taking half up at the bow. There were only 6 of us on the boat so there was plenty of room! We stopped at about 10 different spots on our way around the island, all of them were just perfect.. The best spots were lagoa azul (blue lagoon), lagoa verde (green lagoon) and a lovely little cove which we can’t remember the name of. The weather was perfect so the contrast of the water to the sandy beaches and blue sky was postcard worthy, we could have spent a day at each spot… no actually, it would get boring after a while, and, you would probably get burnt, which makes you hate the sun - a lot. We did some snorkelling and saw some turtles.. They have actually grown some underwater plants on this floating bed of nets so that the turtles come to feed and you can catch a glimpse of them!
After a Ilha Grande
Bonito (beautiful).. rest day we took off on foot again to the other side of the island in a slightly different direction to Lopez Mendez… another pretty beach called Dois Rios, about a 3 hour walk each way. They actually have a shoddy dirt road to this side of the island which they use to access a small community here. There used to be a prison at this spot which was closed only back in 1998, it housed some of the most dangerous criminals in Brasil! They imploded the prison after it closed down so it is mostly just a pile of concrete. It used to be a busy little community when the prison was active but now very few people live there, it is a strange place, almost a bit eerie! Most of the houses that belonged to the families of the prison guards have been abandoned.. Just a very small percentage of them seemed to be used. It was quite odd walking around the streets and houses that were deserted and now overgrown with plants and weeds! It seemed to be a waste of perfectly useful accommodation! Anyway, this spot had a nice little fresh water lagoon, so we kept Ilha Grande
Swimming with the fishies.. away from the salt this time. After a few hours of relaxing we walked back..
Next stop, Paraty. A beautiful little port town with cobbled streets, horse drawn carts, night markets and abundant restaurants! If you are a loyal subscriber then you may realise that we have also been here before on the tour.. The weather restricted us to the grounds of our hotel last visit. This time however the weather continued to pleasure us with fine form!
The town used to be a very important link back when gold mining was big, there was and still is a road that links Rio - Paraty - Sao Paulo that was built by hand to transport the gold to the port before it was shipped to Portugal. Now the place is very touristy… it is the main port on the coast with easy access to 65 islands and over 300 beaches. It also has good shops that offer the usual stuff.. It’s quite nice to walk the streets at night and look around.. I’m a professional ‘looker’ actually, or ’window shopper’.. Sarah is pretty much the opposite, she is more the professional shopper, which encompasses the act of buying. On route
to Paraty.. Just kidding, I’m not that bad ladies.. We do actually buy loads of stuff, well at least Sarah does mostly… we are even about to ship a box home cos we are a bit overloaded at present!
We spent another 5 nights here but had a more relaxing few days than Ilha Grande. We hired a motorbike for one of the days and headed a few km’s south in search of some nice beaches and a waterfall. It proved too difficult for the waterfall with poor signage and lack of understanding of the local tongue when asking for directions, so we settled for just the beach. We passed a security manned gate which was the access to an exclusive community… apparently the properties within were $ 3,000,000 Reais minimum (about 1 million pounds) so quite exclusive, but the rich here in Brasil are mostly very rich, not just wealthy - more the filthy type. They even had their own private beach! …Anyway, we found our beach in the end, the one we were looking for. But it wasn’t that nice and the weather didn’t help. We had more fun with the bike that we hired… after trying to find Paraty
anniversary dinner.. that waterfall and getting back on the highway I’d realised that the gear lever had fallen off… nice! …luckily we were moving when I’d noticed as we were stuck in the fourth gear (impossible to start in!) so we managed to make it back to the hire shop without stopping… and doing 50kms/hr over speed humps so that they could find us a new gear lever! Which they did without any problems. We then headed out again, this is when we visited the beach which to access you had to use the worst dirt road that I’d ever been on… I don’t think the road had any maintenance since they built it, so it was very bumpy indeed…Sarah was mostly airborne! Luckily we had a cross (a bike built for road and dirt), but the suspension was shot! Anyway, after our short stay at the beach we made it back to the bike to find that we had no power, not good with an electric starter.. So I managed to convince Sarah that she had to push me really fast so I could drop it in to gear and get the thing started… after a few goes in 35degree heat Paraty
Cocktails on the street.. and an audience we got it started abruptly by pulling a mono and nearly falling off! It was fun.. Anyway we made it back to the hire shop again and found that the battery cable had broken off, probably when we were on the bumpy stuff! The valuable lesson that I learnt here was to check the bike over thoroughly before you agree to hire it… cos they only hire out the ‘buckets of shit’ to tourists like us! Oh, and it was our 8 year anniversary that day… happy anniversary us!
In the evening we went out to celebrate the occasion (anniversary) with a nice meal, fish actually, complemented with a nice bottle of Brazilian wine! We then headed over to the main square to indulge in the street stands selling cocktails.. It was a Saturday night so there were loads of people out and about. After a few cocktails we made it to a bar/club that was starting to get busy just off the square. It didn’t take long to integrate into the crowd of mostly local people with the weight of a few drinks behind us. We even danced about and talked some Spanglish with the Paraty
Sarah! Get in the water.. waiters from our restaurant! By the time we left, 4 hours later, we had made loads of friends… first name basis only, with poor pronunciations… all in the heat of the night of course! If we had of passed each other in the street the next day we would have denied ever meeting.
After a rest day to catch up with ourselves we took a cruise around the bay to a few of the closer beaches. The day cost us $20 Reais each and included fresh fruit all day, nice fruit too, not the old mouldy kind, fresh as fresh can be, watermelon, apples, pineapple and oranges were on offer, the perfect refreshments after a salt water dip, what a bargain …anyway that $20 Reais works out to just 6 pounds not bad for a full days enjoyment! < sorry but Sarah would like to interrupt this little shindig with an announcement, she is right at this moment, as I type, having one of the most pleasurable experiences drinking a hot chocolate… Ladies, all you need to do is have some hot milk and submerge a chocolate bar, mix it up, let it melt and enjoy… it’s called a Paraty
mmm... Acai.. submarino - bliss! > ok I’m back in control now, apologies. Urm, where was I, ah yep the cruise… it was great, moving on.
Whilst in Paraty we enjoyed eating as the historic center of the town was full of restaurants, serving all types of food but mainly fish as it was a port town… and the fish was incredible too! Sarah discovered Acai, which is a fruit found in Brasil which they freeze …then to serve they blend it up and serve it with grenola, banana and honey… yummy, yummy, yummy! (as Sarah has just screamed in my ear). There was also an ice cream parlour that I kept getting dragged to most days…they’re big in Brasil, basically you go in and self serve up whatever you want …there are loads of different flavours and toppings and you pay by weight!
Next stop was Sao Paulo… about a 6 hour bus ride. Marcos found us a nice hotel to stay in which was close to the main centre, metro line and Marcos’ flat! For those of you who don’t know, Marcos is a friend of the family who came to Tassie on a years exchange and lived Paraty
on our way to the bus.. with my Aunt and Uncle in Launceston (what a raw deal hey, all the way from tropical Salvador for an exchange in Australia and then to be sent to little ol’ Launnie! Although he did get taken on a family holiday to Fiji so that would have made up for it!). It was 12 years ago that he did the exchange so plenty of water under the bridge so to speak.
We spent 5 nights here in total spending our time exploring the cities shopping malls, parks, historical sites and museums. Marcos was fantastic and took us out for dinner, drinks ‘n’ desserts …a club with a live band for more drinks …to a lovely authentic Italian restaurant where our meals were cooked right in front of us …we got a tour of his apartment to see how the Sampa‘s live (the people of the city)…and even a snake farm for some touristy stuff. It was nice to be escorted around with local knowledge in a car and shown places that we never would have gone to otherwise… including a café called Havanna. An Argentinian café chain, it has the most incredible cakes and coffees! A favourite is now Sao Paulo
posing with impressive statue.. a coffee served with caramel around the edges of the glass! (you have to keep turning the cup to make sure you get all the caramel) …we have been back to this place a few times now, it’s perfect - thanks Marcos!
In spite of Sao Paulo having a bad rep (our Lonely Planet doesn’t do it justice), we loved this city (put your hands up!), it reminded us a lot of London and we all know how much we love that place don’t we.
Well, that's it for now...we start our Spanish lessons tomorrow and stay with a local family here in Bariloche...looking forward to being thrown in a bit deeper!
Adios amigos!
Ben & Sarah
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