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Published: June 25th 2011
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After having waited for ages for the bus taking me from Rio airport to the bus station, I finally made it to the terminal at around 4pm.. A quick glance at the screens told me there was a bus at 4.30, which I thought was perfect. Only when I got to the ticket booth, I discovered that there was no space left. The man explained (in Portuguese) that I'd have to get a bus to somewhere in between and change there in order to get to Paraty that night. What would have supposed to be 4 hours was suddenly looking a little less promising. I waited for the first bus for about an hour and then I was off. It was a long time before I arrived at my connecting city (sorry, can't remember the name), not far off 4 hours in fact, so I was starting to think I would arrive in the middle of the night – one of the things I really don't like to do. When I finally got off the bus, I then had to ask around about getting a connection. The language was definitely an issue and I kept being bounced from one person to
the next. Eventually, the driver of the bus that had got me there from Rio, took pity on me and went to find out the information for me. The verdict was that I had to wait one more hour. Not a happy bunny, but with little choice, I decided to go and sit outside, near the platforms. That turned out to be a very lucky decision, as about 2 minutes later, a local bus rolled in, going to Paraty. It had a few shady characters on and I wasn't overly happy when the driver decided to turn the inside lights off so that we could sleep... I was quite tired but was worried that something might happen to my belongings under the cover of darkness... In the end, I ended up falling asleep and only woke up a few minutes before arriving in Paraty, with all my stuff still there and intact. I think it was around 11pm by the time I got off the bus.
I had no city map with me but remembered reading something about the tourist information booth being at the entrance of the old town. As it happened, the hostel recommended by the guide book
was also at the entrance of the old town. So when I saw the tourist booth, I quickly jumped off the bus. I had no real idea about where I was supposed to go, so I stopped to ask directions at the petrol station. The men there were really nice, but I understood from what they said that I was quite a lot further than I thought. So I was set for another thing I don't like to do: walking around areas I don't really know at night... I didn't really have a choice, so I pushed on, trying to look like I knew where I was going and hoping for the best. I checked directions a couple of times on the way and I was nearly at my destination when I spotted another hostel with prices showing at the front: 25R$, which was less than where I had been planning to stay. I went to check it out and was pleasantly surprised, so I decided to stop there instead. It can't have been too far from midnight by that point and I was glad to call it a day.
The next morning I was ready at about 9am to
go and explore the town. It was a glorious day. Camera in hand, I set along the pedestrian cobbled streets, shooting all the beautiful colonial buildings. It was Sunday morning and the streets were empty, which I was more than happy about for the pictures. I walked to the docks and enjoyed looking at all the pretty tour boats. I wouldn't have minded going on a little island tour, but unfortunately, all they seemed to offer were full day tours, which I didn't have time for. After the docks and walked along the sea as far as I could (not very far because the river was in the way) and then had another look inside of the village. There were plenty of cafés and souvenir shops. Everything was loved and cared for, with flowers everywhere and buckets of street cleaners sweeping away dead leaves. It was spotless and very quiet, just the opposite of what I'd experienced during a week in Rio, so I was glad for the change.
After a while walking up and down the cobbles, I decided to cross the river and have a look on the other side. I found a beach with a very fat
Paraty
the "ruins" woman in a very small bikini wobbling all over the place. I wasn't too taken by the sight so decided to keep walking. There were signs pointing up a hill to go to “the castle” so I decided to head that way. I found the site without too many problems, but I didn't really find the castle. There may have been a couple of canons and small portions of walls here and there, but calling this a castle was a bit of a joke. Inside of the boundaries of the ruins, there was a small path which I decided to follow. This took me down to some big rocks by the sea. I sat down for a while, taking it all in and enjoying the sunshine.
The problem with Paraty is that there are apparently a lot of very nice beaches nearby, but as I only had until 1pm to have a look around before catching my onward bus, I didn't get a chance to go and explore them... After buying my bus ticket, some lunch and having a quick check of my e-mails, I still had about an hour to kill. So I strolled around the town one more
time. Half a day definitely wasn't enough to spend there, but you can't do everything, so it was time to move on. So at 1pm, I got on the bus to my next destination: Sao José Dos Campos.
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delphine
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super photo, mai stout le village a l'air vraiment sympa. ca donne envoe d'y aller... et de profiter des plages!