Sao Paulo

After nearly three years, we were on the road, or rather, in the air. With flights from Vancouver grounded a few days before our flight due to the winter storms, which had now moved towards Montreal, Cheryl and I were happy with the mere 2.5 hour delay leaving Vancouver. With only a two hour layover scheduled in Montreal, we were worried about missing our connecting flight to Sao Paulo. However, when we looked at our arrival and departure gate, we realized they were the same. As luck would have it, our connecting flight was the same plane we were currently on. Needless to say, we made the connecting flight and it left a few hours late.

Leaving late actually worked out fine, as we were originally scheduled to get in about 4am PST, so we were happy to have a few extra hours of sleep on the plane with the later departure. Upon arrival, we found the free shuttle which took us to the airport metro station, and about an hour and a half later checked into our hostel. We were staying in the Mariana neighbourhood, close to Ibirapuera Park and home to lots of bars and restaurants. It was therefore easy to find a restaurant for a late lunch, if difficult to order (we were looking forward to having Marieke along for much of the trip with her Portugese skills). Luckily, google translate made it a bit less painful. Travel is changing!

After a very early night (we forced ourselves to stay up til about 7pm), we headed into the centre of the city for a walking tour. It was a great introduction to the city and the country, and we picked up some tips for future use- highly recommended.

We spent the afternoon in Ibirapuera Park with all the other Paulistas (people from Sao Paulo) out for a walk and a bike ride before grabbing pizza to eat at the hostel and packing for our morning bus to Paraty. Located on the coast between Sao Paulo and Rio, Paraty is a popular, well-preserved colonial beach town. So popular that everyone else was going there too- apparently 60% of Paulistas leave the city for the coast. Which explains how we ended up in so much traffic our bus pulled in 6 hours late, at 9pm. Thank god it was a super comfy bus (as would turn out to be the norm in Brazil).

Paraty

It had been raining (or pouring) much of the trip, so we were pretty grateful to arrive dry, particularly because we were camping for four nights over New Year’s due to the crazy accommodation prices. Luckily, the campsite had tarps set up, so we set up our small tent under it, very cozy to a couple of other tents. We were glad we did as it poured rain that night!

We were expecting Jon and Marieke to join us that evening, but they were flying through Toronto, so got delayed by a day with the winter weather there. They made a night out of it though, visiting Marieke’s cousins in Toronto, and were able to reschedule their bus to Paraty for the the following day.

With a day to spare, Cheryl and I decided to go for a hike and explore a more secluded, nicer beach than the ones in town. We managed to find the right local bus and the path to the beach. Along the way we bypassed a huge line of people with a lot of gear which was a bit perplexing. We made our way along the very muddy path due to all the recent rain to what would turn out to be a very busy and very not secluded beach. Turns out the queue was for people waiting for boats to transport them to the beach to stay for the night or weekend! While not what we had in mind, it was a pretty chill atmosphere and a nice beach and it was great to get some exercise.

With Marieke and Jon scheduled to come in at 3pm barring crazy traffic, we spent the next day exploring the cute town and the surrounding beaches. Luckily the traffic was fine and they arrived pretty much right on time, on New Year’s Eve. Travellers unite! While we weren’t exactly at the centre of things when the new year occurred, we did walk across the road to see the fireworks being lit in seemingly every direction, including, fairly worryingly, from the gas station next to us. Although not quite as harrowing an experience of fireworks for New Year’s in India.

I had saved the best activity for our final day in Paraty- finding a natural waterslide in the jungle! It was actually super easy to find as it was quite popular, and for good reason. It was awesome. There were even two men helping guide and pull people down the rock face so they could slide into a deep pit of fresh river water. Needless to say, we got in line. The ride itself was great, although my favourite part may have been the vantage point from the bottom of the slide, watching the faces of everyone from children to grandmas slide down in mostly joy and a little terror. And the local kids showing off by surfing down the slide. After that, we found the Tarzan bar and had our first (of what would sure to be many) caipirinhas of the trip. A great day.