We will have around 4 weeks to travel through this enormous country. We will have a lot of flights scheduled since this country is simply too big to drive through.
We will start in Sao Paolo to visit some friends.
Thereafter we fly to Manaus where we want to stay a few nights in a jungle resort. We continue with visiting Belem, Fortaleza and Salvador.
Of course we will have some days in each city to discover the city itself and the surrounding areas.
We also plan to do some nice hikes in the area of Lencois de Bahia.
Then we will travel to the waterfalls of Iguassu and will finally end up in Rio de Janeiro.
Sao Paulo
Thursday we flew to Lima in the afternoon and later that night to Sao Paulo, Brazil where we arrived at 3.30 in the morning.
After having spent almost 3 months in Spanish speaking countries, the switch to Portuguese didn´t go that smoothly. We started practising the basic words right on arrival at the airport, but it looked easier than it actually was. Where as in Spanish you pronounce the words as they are written, in Portuguese however the pronunciation is quite different from its´ written form. Hopefully after a month in Brazil we can speak and understand Portuguese a bit!
At 7 o´clock we took a taxi to the house of Sandra (an ex-colleague of mine), her husband Björn and their son Eric.
After having had breakfast and a quick nap we were picked up by Fabio (another colleague of mine from Loders time) to have lunch and saw the football match: Argentina - Germany. They had hung up an extremely big TV screen and we watched the game with numerous Brazilians, who were all having a really long lunch break. After a few minutes we found out that the Brazilians were not in favour of Argentina, which we had assumed before the game. They were all extremely happy when Germany finally won (like they had won themselves!). So this was quite a funny experience!
That night we went out to dinner with Björn and Sandra to a great Australian restaurant, where they served the juiciest stake and very nice dark beer from the tap.
After a good night sleep (which we really needed since we had basically skipped the previous night due to our flight schedule), Sandra and I went to the beautician. She had her nails done and I had a relaxing massage for an hour! You can imagine that this was quite a luxury after having travelled for almost 4 months!
In the meantime Rolf joining a tennis match with Björn and his friends. Unfortunately he had to stop after one game, since his back didn't agree with him playing tennis.
Sandra and I continued our tour through the shopping malls of Sao Paulo, since I desperately (yes really!) needed some new clothes. We had been invited namely to join them in going to their friends wedding party, and the clothes I had were just not suited to go to such an event. Luckily I found some really nice clothes.
In the afternoon we went with Fabio to a really nice bar to enjoy a typical Brazilian dish: "Feijoada" which was originally created by the slaves in the colonial Brazil; They started cooking the pork meats that Farmland owners discarded such as ear, tails, feet in a big pot with black beans. Since then, they replaced these pork parts with pork sirloin and sausages. It was really a nice dish!
We then watched the football game Brazil - France, which unfortunately didn´t end to well. We would have loved to experience a true Brazilian party which it would have been, if they had won the game.
After we returned from the bar we went to the wedding party of Claudia and Paulo, friends of Sandra and Björn. The party was held in a beautiful house, just 30 minutes outside of Sao Paulo. It was a great party with really nice people, good music and good food. (if you didn´t want to have another drink you had to hide your glass!)
Sunday the second of July we visited Sao Paulo center and a nice museum showing the history of Sao Paulo. Although the weather wasn´t all that good, we still got a fairly good impression of the city. The city center has a few nice historical buildings but they are unfortunately surrounded by buildings which are covered with graffiti. Also a lot of buildings are left abandoned, and just deteriorate even more. While walking and driving through the city you clearly see that there is a huge gap between the rich and the poor. Especially in the center we saw a lot of homeless people, who had built their ´house´just outside the cathedral, in the park. They even close the church between services to prevent them from coming in.
Some residential areas however are really beautiful. They usually consist of a few apartment buildings and communal buildings and areas, like f.i. playing grounds for children, a tennis court and a swimming pool. To enter you need to pass security, which is unfortunately necessary due to the fact that Sao Paulo is not quite safe.
We also visited the Mercado Municipal where we got to taste the most exotic fruits you had ever seen (or tasted!). They really had fruits from all over de world and the best quality money could buy!
In the afternoon we met Sandra´s sister, her husband and his mother to have lunch.
Since we were going to leave to Manaus the next day, we checked in the evening if the flight was confirmed. A week before namely we had learnt through the tour operator where we had booked a jungle tour in Manaus, that Varig - the flight company - was on the verge of bankruptcy, and that it was cancelling its flights. Fortunately the flight to Manaus was still confirmed.
Monday morning we flew from Sao Paulo to Manaus.
Amazonas
In Manaus we were picked up from the airport by Eduardo, who then took us to the office of the tour operator to finalise the details for the jungle tour. Thereafter he took us to our hotel. By driving through the city, we already got the impression that the city is a bit rundown. We only saw a few nice looking buildings, the rest wasn´t really worth looking at. It is big and crowded with quite a lively city center full of clothing and electronic equipment shops. You also run into a lot of street vendors.
The next morning we went by taxi to the harbour, where the boat was. We had booked a four day jungle tour on a floating lodge, located 60 km upstream the Rio Negro. Due to the higher acid content of the Rio Negro, there are less mosquito's in this area.
First the boat took us a bit in the opposite direction to see the meeting of the rivers; the Rio Negro and the Rio Amazonas. The Rio Negro is (like the name already indicates) almost black due to the decomposing vegetation, the Rio Amazonas however is much lighter because it has a different origin. The waters don´t really blend for a couple of kilometres. Since the rivers were however at the highest level, due to the rainy season, the meeting of the two different types of water, wasn´t really too clear.
Thereafter the boat took us to the Anaconda lodge. It was a really basic lodge, only consisting of a few simple rooms, a dining area, and the kitchen. The place was also being renovated during the time of our visit.
We were met by Markus, who was going to be our guide for the next few days. Already in the beginning we could tell that tour organisation wasn´t really one of their strong suites! Everyone in our group had booked a different package, with a different itinerary. With only 1 guide available, this eventually caused some serious discussions and also some compromising. Practically before every tour, we had a new argument on what to do and where to go, which got quite tiring and at some point also pretty hilarious. Sometimes they also just kept us waiting without telling us what we should or could do next. Then when you were just about to relax in your hammock, they announced that we would leave for the next excursion within 1 minute! Also the equipment (like our only way of transport in the jungle, the motorboats), let us down quite some times. Either the boat ran full of water within 5 minutes of boarding it, or we almost lost the propeller.
After having put our luggage in our room and having had lunch, we left on our first excursion; piranha fishing. Unfortunately the piranhas were not in the mood, which according to the guide happened more often in or just after the rainy season. They could find plenty of food by themselves without having to wait for some tourists throwing pieces of steak in the water! I (Linda) did however catch the only fish of the day (forgot the name).
After dinner we went alligator spotting. Also that wasn´t as easy as you might expect in the Amazon. We had arrived in the Amazonas just after the rainy season. A week before the water had reached its highest level which was sometimes 20 meters higher than in the dry season. Wildlife like alligators got consequently more difficult to spot as there is more place for them to hide and find their food. After a couple of hours (leaving us with sore behinds because of the wooden benches!) the guides spotted and catched a baby alligator. Mama alligator was supposedly nearby, but too afraid to show herself.
Although we were in the middle of the jungle, someone had had the brilliant idea to start a bar on the bench of the Rio Grande. So before heading back to the lodge, we enjoyed some cold (yes they do have electricity!) beers.
That night back in the lodge, we found out that it is pretty difficult to find your stuff in the backpack with only a candle to give you light!
Wednesday morning we went for a jungle walk. Although we didn´t see much wildlife, we did saw a lot of medicinal plants and trees and learnt how they are used by the Indian people.
In the afternoon we went peddling through the jungle forest, which is only possible this time of year due to the high waters. This was really an amazing experience seeing all the trees and plants standing in a few meters water, some practically submerged.
Right after our return from our paddling trip, we had to clear out our room, pack our overnight bag and leave for our night in the jungle! This wasn´t really according to our trip-itinerary, but we quickly learnt to go with the flow. First of course we made a quick stop at the bar to get some beers, which are of course necessary for our survival in the jungle! After a two hour boat ride, crossing the Rio Negro, and ending up deep in the jungle forest, we finally arrived near the campsite. Luckily the guide knew the way, since we couldn´t see a hand before our eyes! After a 5 minute walk with the food and sleeping gear, we reached the really basic campsite at 9 in the evening. This was a few hours later than originally planned. Rolf and Mike hung up the hammocks and mosquito nets, while the guide put the chickens on the fire for our dinner. He also made from palm leaves and wood, our ´plates´ and ´cutlery´. About 2 hours later, we all enjoyed the best chicken ever!
Shortly after dinner, we went to bed, or better said to our hammocks!
We slept surprisingly well. Thursday morning we were woken by the guide to have breakfast. We then also could see for the first time, how pretty the location was, near a waterfall (and shower). The downside of our jungle visit, only got rather clear a few days later. We were then covered with red spots indicating the numerous bites of the mosquito's. Somehow they had found their way through the protective nets.
We returned to the lodge in the morning after which we went for another peddling trip. We visited another area of jungle forest, where again we didn´t see much wildlife, but did come across a lot of bugs and insects falling off the bushes and trees when we passed them in our boat. The scenery however and the variety in vegetation was beautiful.
After lunch we visited a village of indigenous people. They waited for us in their original clothing and showed us their homes and their crafts-work. We then also walked through the rest of the small village where we could see how they live nowadays. Beside the fact that they also wear normal clothes they maintained a lot of their traditions like growing their own medicinal plants.
Friday we went on our last excursion with Markus. He took us for a very long boat ride to another part of the jungle forest.
During this trip we saw monkeys, lots of different birds, grey and pink dolphins (fresh water dolphins) and mermaids (also looked a bit like a dolphin). This last excursion was really one of the highlights for us. We had also brought our fishing equipment to try to catch a piranha, but only Markus got lucky this time! He caught the red piranha, which is the most vicious one around.
That afternoon we got the big boat back to Manaus where we said goodbye to our fellow passengers Ole and Mike. We returned to the same hotel.
At this time we also checked with the airport our next flight, which would supposedly leave at 5 in the morning. We then learnt that Varig had cancelled this flight but that we could get on the afternoon flight of another airliner TAM. This meant that we could sleep in and enjoy a really good breakfast in the hotel.
When we arrived at the airport at 12 o´clock we found out that all flights to Belem by TAM were full for the next 2 days! You can imagine that we were not too happy about that. Varig informed us that they wouldn´t be flying on this destination at all, nor would they fly directly on Salvador or Fortaleza! This meant that we could not follow our original Brazil schedule. After having spent 2 hours at the desk of Varig, we finally changed most of our tickets and thus our schedule in Brazil.
Salvador
That afternoon we flew via Brasilia to Rio de Janeiro, where we had to spend the night before flying to Salvador the next afternoon! In Rio, we took a bus downtown and arrived in our hotel at midnight (I wasn´t scared at all walking with our backpacks through Rio in the middle of the night!). The hotel was really nice and by coincidence we got to see the movie ´The Terminal´- telling the story of someone (Tom Hanks) being stuck at an airport since he didn´t have the papers to leave.
The following day we took the bus back to the airport, where our plane would leave for Salvador at 3 o´clock. We were already a bit sceptical about this flight, but got really p-off when we saw the sign ´cancelled´ on the TV displays at the gate. We immediately went back to the check-in counter, to ask for an explanation. According to him the flight would only be ´slightly´ delayed, but not cancelled. Surprisingly when we got back to the gate, they had changed the sign cancelled in delayed!
We finally arrived in Salvador at 6 in the evening. We took a bus downtown and started to look around in search for a hostel. Since we couldn´t rely on Varig´s flight schedule anymore, we were also not able to book any accommodation. Luckily we ran into someone who took us to a fairly decent pousada in the city center.
Monday we spent exploring the neighbourhood of our hotel. Since the hotel was in the middle of the historic center of Salvador, it was very easy for us to walk to all the interesting sites. This particular neighbourhood has been placed on UNESCO world heritage list, and since 1980 almost 75 % of the buildings have been restored. Unfortunately there is no money to renovate the areas in Salvador which are not placed on the list, so these buildings are in a very poor state.
Part of these neighbourhoods are also not safe to walk through. They have a high percentage of drug addicts and homeless people. A lot of them come to the center to beg the tourists for money or food. We were advised not to give anything, since they would trade the food or the money immediately for drugs.
Because Salvador was one of the most important Portuguese colonies in Brazil who held many African slaves, the state Bahia now has a population consisting for 75 % of African descendants or a mix between Portuguese and Africans.
The African influence in people, food and culture is very visible in the streets. At night you often see percussion bands playing their drums and you see them doing some sort of fight/dance; the capoeira.
Tuesday morning we had a tour through the historic center with a Belgian guide. He explained us a lot about the history of the city and the numerous colonial buildings.
We also visited a church which inside had absolutely no space left for any more decorations because it was already filled with angels, holy figures and animals, all plastered with gold.
Wednesday we spent most of the day looking for the bus ticket office in town to buy tickets to go to Lençois. Everywhere we went and whomever we asked, we kept ending up in the wrong place. We did however get to see one of the busiest commercial areas in the city and two shopping malls! This area was much busier than the Pelourinho where we had our hotel. In the afternoon we finally succeeded in getting to the proper bus station and buying the tickets for Lençois.
That evening we went to a very nice restaurant to try the Bahian speciality; Moqueca de peixe - fish with tomatoes, bell peppers and onions, cooked in coconut cream. This was really delicious and pretty nice as a change to everything fried you usually can find to eat in Brazil.
Thursday we left our hotel very early and took a taxi to the bus station. From there we took the bus to Lençois, where we arrived 6 hours later. Lençois is a tiny town with brightly coloured houses, located in the Chapada Diamantina, a National Park. That afternoon we booked a tour for the next day to visit of few of the most famous sites in the park.
Friday we were picked up at 9 by a mini-van. During the day we visited beautiful caves, waterfalls and plateaus with beautiful panoramic views. Check out the pictures!
Saturday we took it really easy, just lying in our hammock in front of our room and having a few beers on a terrace in town. We had met an American travel writer the day before, who had joined us for drinks. We exchanged our travelling experiences and thoughts about the ´typical´ Dutch and the ´typical´ Americans.
Sunday we went on an excursion to visit the Cachoeira da Fumaça waterfall. Unfortunately the weather wasn´t too good. In fact it kept on raining all the way during our difficult climb up and part of our descent. The falls were really impressive with its 400 mtr drop! On our way down the weather finally cleared up so we were able to see the beautiful scenery.
Monday the 17th of July, we took the 7.30 bus back to Salvador. We had decided not to return to the historic center but to find a hotel in the Barra beach area, just 5km out of the center. We found a really nice (and cheap) hotel with a great roof terrace overlooking an old fortress and the beach.
The rest of the day we spent drinking coconut milk and exploring the area around the hotel. Just like in the center there were lots and lots of people selling sunglasses, food, sarongs and so on.
Although we usually say ´não obrigado´ to everybody, we did have a barbecued cheese stick, which was really good!
Tuesday we didn´t do an awful lot, just hang out on the beach and visiting a really classy shopping mall. We were glad to have a nice place to stay outside of the city center since there you were a lot more harassed (by beggars) than in the beach area.
Our last day in Salvador we went back to the center of Salvador by bus. We visited the artisan market which lay in the lower part of the city.
You could really find some nice art and crafts work there. In the historic center we bought our second hammock, which we immediately shipped back home. It weighed over 2kg, so you wouldn´t want to carry it around more than you had to!
In the afternoon we took the bus to the airport, since we had a flight to São Paulo at 17.30 followed by a flight to Fortaleza. We were not to worried about these flights since we had received a completely new and rescheduled air-pass from Varig! Our optimism however was greatly misplaced. Our flight to São Paulo and Fortaleza got delayed with an hour and a half, which finally led to our arrival in Fortaleza at 3 in the morning.
Fortaleza - Canoa Quebrada
Because we wanted to take a bus in the morning to Canoa Quebrada from Fortaleza, we decided to stay at the airport and wait for the first buses to leave.
We took a bus at 7 am which we thought would take us to the bus terminal where the buses to different cities leave from. However we got it wrong and no one could tell us which way to go. So we were walking around town with our (still 19 kg each) backpacks with 30 degr.C, without any clue on where to go, and not feeling all that happy.
At 9 in the morning we ran into someone in the streets who told us which bus to take. At the bus terminal we bought our tickets to Canoa Quebrada, a little beach town 3,5 hrs south of Fortaleza. We had really enjoyed our beach stay our last days in Salvador, so we had decided to do some more relaxing on the beaches near Fortaleza!
When we arrived in Canoa Quebrada, we were welcomed by a few hostel owners, who of course all wanted you to come to their hostel. One of them was Evert, a Dutch guy, who took us to his hostel in his buggy. The rooms had great views on the ocean and the atmosphere in the hostel was really relaxed, so we decided to stay. Evert also gave us some good tips on where to go for drinks and food.
The town was very pretty with numerous nice restaurants and bars. Also the beach was gorgeous. The town was surrounded by beautiful sand dunes as far as you could see. These are also one of the main attractions to come to this village besides of course the beaches. There are probably more buggies in town to race the tourists through the dunes, then there are cars!
At night we enjoyed a local folk dance contest at the square. Friday, the 21st of June we first booked our bu strip back to Fortaleza and then changed our flight with LAN from Santiago de Chile to Auckland from the 7th of August to the 19th of September (so we can add Bolivia and Argentina to our itinerary).
We then spent some time on the beach before taking a trip with a buggy through the dunes and watching the sunset. Especially the steep descends were great fun!
After another relaxing day at the beach, we took the bus back at 17.30, arriving there at 9 o´clock. As our flight to Rio and Foz de Iguaçu was scheduled to leave at 6.15, we decided to spend another night at the airport (boring!).
When the Varig desk finally opened at 5 o´clock we were informed that all Varig flights were cancelled up to the 28th of July! You can hopefully imagine that we were not able to take this news very elegantly after having spent the night on the airport. After harassing the Varig officer for about an hour, he finally got us on a flight to São Paulo (which was actually completely booked and overbooked), with the promise that we could get on a GOL or TAM flight to Iguassu on arrival. We were not convinced of the latter, but were glad to be able to leave Fortaleza anyway. On arrival at SP, we learnt that TAM was also completely booked to Iguassu, and that they could only put us on a waiting list. Our next try with GOL worked out a lot better. They got us on the 16.00hr flight, which meant another 6 hrs of waiting. But to look at the bright side, we were going to Iguaçu!
When buying a few books and an American newspaper, we also saw an article in a Brazilian newspaper that Varig had cancelled all their flights up to the 28th of July except the flights from Rio to São Paulo which were still making money. We immediately realised that it would be difficult getting back from Iguassu to Rio as well. So upon arrival in Iguassu we went to the Varig desk to ask for a cancellation statement for our return flight. This is the only way to be able to make a reservation for a GOL flight without having to pay for it. But of course this wasn´t possible, although it was clear that all Varig flights were cancelled. They can only 'officially' cancel flights one day before! Consequently we will have to go to the airport one day before we want to fly to get the statement from Varig and book a new flight with GOL (its driving us nuts to say the least!). We did decide to extend our stay in Iguassu with one day, leaving the 27th of July.
Foz de Iguaçu
From the airport of Iguaçu we took the bus to the bus terminal in town. We had found a hotel in the lonely planet which would be nearby. Just as we left the terminal we ran into a nice guy whose job was to take tourists to hotels in town. Although we he showed us a hotel nearby the terminal, we finally ended up (6 blocks walking further!) in a really nice hotel more in the city center with a really big swimming pool, cable TV (nice for a change after only being able to see really bad Brazilian soap series!) and a mini-bar in the room.
Monday the 24th of July, we started our day with having a really nice breakfast in the hotel. Breakfast in Brazil is very different from everything we have experienced so far. Although they do have the ´standard stuff´ like bread, ham and cheese, eggs and sausages and fruit, the major part of the breakfast consists of at least 7 different kind of cakes!
After having breakfast we took the bus to the Brazilian part of the Iguaçu Falls. When we arrived at the National Park, we took the park-bus, which took us to the beginning of the walk to the falls. The first look on the falls we got, was actually a bit disappointing. This is one of the downsides travelling to such a spot in the dry(!) season, without any rain the waterfalls dry up quite quickly. We had to check out the postcard pictures later on to see how they can look!
When walking to the actual beginning of the waterfall, we were glad to find out there was still plenty of water going through this part! Since it was a beautiful day we were also lucky enough to see a beautiful rainbow just over the waterfall.
At night we went to a restaurant which was recommended by the guy who had taken us to our hotel the day before. Although not quite the nicely decorated place, with dimmed lights and candles, the food was extremely good! For only 8 reais p/p (=3 EUR), you could take as much vegetables from the buffet as you like, and take an unlimited amount of different types meat which they were constantly preparing.
Tuesday, before having breakfast, we took a nice dip in the swimming pool. Thereafter we took a bus to the Itaipu Dam, which is the biggest hydro-power station in operation in the world. It is half owned by Brazil and half by Paraguay.
After having seen a video on the building of the dam a tour-bus to us to a look out point, where you could have a good overall view on the dam. Then it drove on the dam wall giving us a view on both sides of the dam. Maybe not as impressive as some ´natural wonders´ it is still an impressive piece of engineering. The dam provides 25 % of Brazil's electric power and 95% of Paraguay's´.
Wednesday we first went to the airport to get confirmation on our flight back to Rio. The Varig staff here was very helpful (nice for a change) and they got us a confirmed flight for Thursday afternoon with GOL.
Thereafter we took the bus to the Argentinian side of the waterfalls. This side of the falls proved to be a lot busier than the Brazilian side. We never saw so many people at a touristic site before!
In the national park we first took a bus and then a small train to the beginning of a walking trail and bridge to the Garganta del Diablo. Although as said overloaded with tourists, the view on such masses of water falling over the edge was amazing!
Hereafter we took the train back and walked a trail through the rain forest to see the lower parts of the waterfall. Although quite pretty, it wasn´t that overwhelming as it could have been with more water running through.
End of the afternoon we returned to Puerto Iguaçu, the small Argentinian village nearest to the waterfalls. We there visited a small handcrafts market before heading back to Foz de Iguaçu.
Rio de Janeiro
Thursday we arrived in Rio at 20.30 hrs there we took a bus to the city center to find a hostel in the Botafogo Barrio. The hostel we originally wanted to stay in was full (and not really our style as well), so we ended up two doors further where they only had dorm beds available.
Fortunately the 15 bed dorm was only occupied by 3 others, so that wasn´t too bad. The next morning we could move to a private room however, which we did.
Friday we were picked up at 10 in the morning for a full day city tour.
First he took us to the foot of the mountain Pedro Bonito, which we then climbed. On top we had a brilliant view on Ipanema beach and a few of the Barios of Rio (neighbourhoods). You could clearly see the ´nice´ neighbourhoods built next to the ´favela´s´, the slums of Rio. We were extremely lucky with the weather although it was a bit hazy. The temperature was unusually high for the time of year (30 degr. C in winter!), but we were not complaining!
Next he took us to the Christ Redeemer (Cristo Redentor) Statue. Of course you cannot visit Rio and not go to the Jesus statue! It was very impressive due to its size but also because of its position on top of a hill overlooking the city. The rolling stairs and the elevator leading all the way up to the statue, were unfortunately a little bit less authentic compared to the stone steps!
We then drove through a really pretty hilltop neighbourhood, Barrio Santa Teresa, known for its historic mansions and artistic atmosphere.
The Barrio Lapa next to Santa Teresa also has a remarkable site. The "convent stairway" is composed of 215 steps covered with a dazzling mosaic of broken ceramic tiles that lead up to the convent of Santa Teresa. Selaron, a Chilean artist, began the staircase as a gift to his favourite city.
Initially, he purchased antique tiles in Brazil's national colours of green, yellow and blue, but soon people began sending him tiles of all colours from all over the world. The result is stunning!
To end our tour, our guide brought us to the entrance of the two stage cable car leading up to Sugar Loaf Mountain. Since it was the end of the day, we were able to see ´Rio by night´from the top of the mountain, really lovely!
Saturday the winter had decided to kick into Rio, so the temperature dropped to around 16 degr and it rained practically all day. We did go out to do some shopping (some new clothes!) and we went to see the movie ´Pirates of the Caribbean´ in a shopping mall nearby.
Sunday the 30th of July, we got up really early to catch a bus to the airport. After having waited for over an hour, we finally gave up and took a taxi (hé, at least we tried to mind our budget!) After a few hours waiting on the airport of Santiago de Chile, we flew in 5 1/2 hours to one of the most remote places of the world 'Easter island' or as they say in Spanish 'Isla de Pasqua'.
After having spent a month in Brazil, we now had to close this chapter of our journey. It has left us with mixed feelings. Of course we have had a lot of problems with Varig, which also forced us to change our schedule and even skip a destination (Belem) altogether. The way this crisis was handled by Varig didn´t win any beauty contest!
We have seen some beautiful sceneries in for instance the jungle Manaus, the mountains in Lençois de Bahia and the falls of Iguaçu. We also got a bit of an impression of a few of the major cities in Brazil. We now know for sure that we are not really big city people. Because you often only have a few days to explore, the big cities are simply to big and also too busy. Even finding a bus terminal is then a very unnerving task.
The thing that really struck us again (like in each country so far in South America) is the poverty and the bad conditions a lot of people have to live in. We really felt like the ´rich tourist´ again, even though we didn´t show off any valuables on the street and we did dress down (which is not so hard nowadays looking at our wardrobe!). But despite all that, you still are a gringo and consequently you have more money than they do.
We were lucky enough to meet some really nice people along the way (travellers and locals) although the language barrier is even more of a problem here than it has been in other countries. Almost nobody speaks English and with even our best mixture of Spanish and Portuguese, they often couldn´t follow us.
We will now say goodbye to Brazil and will have to leave the rest of this enormous country for future trips to be discovered.
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