Great Big World Out There

and then you fly

I've got a major hitch in my giddyup today.  I got an SOS call from my dad this morning, so I answered that and then ended up moving stuff out of the old house.  I left it for the last time this afternoon.

Weird, that.

So, back to Rio.  We were all set to go hang gliding - I remember the Australians being jealous of us - they were doing a city tour that day, Jesus, Sugarloaf, Tijuca (which I never saw, come to think of it).  I was weirded out the whole morning.  I was looking forward to it but remembering my luck with flying adventures - I was the one that crashed in the ocean when parasailing in 2005.

This was jumping off a damn cliff.  Anyway.  Our driver came right to the hostel to pick us up in an open top jeep.  It was a fair drive out to the flight centre and I used this time to wonder what exactly I was doing.  During our conversation  with the hostel guy the night before he'd shown us the gopro video he'd shot of himself doing the hang gliding thing.  It was awesome - and something he said stuck with me.  He'd gone first and had to spend a long time on the beach waiting for his friend to make it down - the way it works is you go up with one guy and if there are two of you, one goes first and the other waits up top.  He'd spent a lot of time on the beach watching people land and he said all the girls fell when they were landing.  He'd spent a lot of time laughing at the girls falling.

I was determined that I would not fall.  How I would manage that I wasn't sure.  This is what was on my mind as we drove to the flight centre.

I think Airell asked me more than once if I was sure I wanted to do this.  He had reason to ask, I really wasn't feeling well and I'd struggled at the cave diving place.  Here I was just going to be a passenger though.  How bad could it be?

So once you arrive at the flight centre you have to sign a waiver and fill out some information - all on a computer.  It was pretty standard, name, address, passport number, maybe next of kin and oddest of all - your blood type.

That threw me for a loop.  Airell wasn't too sure either, but we laughed it off and headed off with Edson, our flight specialist dude after we received our official flight id cards.  I still have mine - I found it in a backpack a few months ago.  Edson had a helper with him, whose job it was to set up the glider up on the gliding mountain (we got into the equivalent of an old toyota camry that had the glider strapped to the top) and make sure we took off ok.

We had to get out of the car just before we got to the final parking area - that old car couldn't quite make the last bit of the incline.  By this point I was thinking, wtf am I doing?  There were gliders lined up in a row:

As your turn got closer, the gliders got moved to the edge of the cliff.

They've built a wooden platform from which gliders launch themselves and there are numbers on it marking where you stop and wait for your turn.

Airell had announced that he wanted to go first, but Edson insisted that I go first, since I'm a girl and all.  Exactly as the guy from the hostel had predicted, in fact. Ha!

Edson made me put on a yellow shirt - still not sure why this was necessary, but I did it.  You follow the rules of the guy that's taking your life in his hands.  Even if they do seem stupid.  So then we had to practice running together - we had to be in perfect sync when we ran off the cliff.

I am pleased to report that this is when I fell down.  Three steps and I was done.  Now - I was all rigged up in the harness stuff that attaches to the glider, so.... yeah. I'm still a klutz.  Airell killed himself laughing.  AS I WOULD HAVE DONE TO HIM.  

We tried again, a couple times more, and I could run without falling! Whee!!  

Lovely spot, no?

As we waited our turn - time did that speeding up thing.  I was ready to do this, I wanted to do this, but damn, it's kinda intimidating to run off the side of a cliff, no matter how many other idiots are doing it.  

But once you do, you're flying. And that is so awesome you kinda want to go back and do it again.

I paid extra to get the video and stills from the 2 go-pros mounted on the glider.  When I remember running of the cliff I remember yelling obscenities as we ran.  I watched the video a few weeks ago, and I am pleased to report that I only yelled them inside my head.  

I had a hard time watching the video - I know it ends well since I'm sitting here watching it.  It still sets my nerves on edge.  However, at the end of the day? 

Awesomeness.  How could you resist that view?  Of all the crazy stuff I've done - this may just win.

I had a fairly long wait for Airell to come floating down.  I got myself a coconut water, settled into a spot on the beach to watch people land and negotiated for the videos/pictures and ran into the Australians - they'd just done the hang gliding, ditching their tour group for a bit.  Ha!  They were cool.  Wish I remembered their names or had facebook friended them.

I got some cool video of Airell landing - I thought I was practicing for when he actually was going to land but turns out I was actually rather clever.  

Imagine that.  Now I can't find the damn video, so perhaps I'm not so clever after all.  

grilled cheese and banana sandwich? Yes please.

I have great hopes that I'll get through Rio in this episode of whatever this is. A travel log? That's overdue by a year? Me just blathering for the heck of it? Whatever it is, I am hoping I'll just shut up about it after this.

Wednesday in Rio.  Some friends and I travelled over to Santa Teresa for lunch and a wander through this charming little spot.    

 Tahira (headband) and Suzanna (long blond hair next to me) were also leaving Rio later that day. Tahira was going home, Suzanna was off on a months long sojourn through South America.  I watched her travels on facebook and drooled with jealousy.

The food at this little spot was excellent. 

The plates were twee, the sandwich delicious.  We wandered the streets of Santa Teresa, wandering in to a fancy hotel/restaurant/club thing, took some pictures and left.  Santa Teresa has some fascinating tiles and pretty bits:

We made our way back to the hostel, eventually. Fred continued his lessons on how to speak proper BBC english.  Apparently it's all about elongating your vowels.  We also had a long conversation about snogging in the taxi. Why do I remember this? I think we drove by the love hotel again - maybe that's why snogging came up. Figuratively, I feel compelled to point out.

Couldn't begin to tell you what I did with the rest of the afternoon - other than signing up for hang gliding the next day.  I went for supper with Airell and Fred at the kilo restaurant just outside our hostel.  They had caiphirinia - regular size and grande.

I didn't have any plans for the evening so I figured ehhh, why not? I had the grande.  

I was swiftly stupider than usual but also very happy.  I recall that Fred was not happy to be going home - and was just basically questioning everything to do with life.

I can say from personal experience this is a pretty common thing amongst backpackers/travellers in South America.  I felt it myself.

We finished eating and it was not near time for Fred's taxi to arrive.  So we ordered another round of drinks.  Airell got his own grande caiphirinia and I? Had another.  

Sweet. Heavenly. Christmas. On. A. Jewish. Cracker.

I wasn't sure what language was my mother tongue by the time I finished that drink.  There's a saying in Rio that after a certain number of caiphirnias you can speak portuguese.  They aren't far off.  We waved Fred off, sadly, then, as it was only 7pm we went back to the hostel and spent a happy hour or so deciding what we might do with the rest of the evening.

The hostel guy had lots of options.  This bar! That place! This thing! That other thing!

We eventually settled on a nightclub that let girls in for free (or almost free) and charged guys $20. But! Beer was free between 10pm and midnight.  They also did samba lessons.

Like I needed more alcohol at that point!  After making ourselves beautiful (ok, after Airell made himself beautiful) we headed out to the club.  

We were early.  There's nothing more off-putting than an empty club so we decided to walk around the area.  That's when we found a street fair a block or so away - right by the beach.  

We bought things. Oh my crap, we bought almost all the things.  Weird stringed instruments. 2 of them! One for each of us! A 2-person hammock - THAT I DIDN'T WANT! (now am very glad I have it, will look lovely on my deck) Where would I put it while at the club? But I started bartering for fun and then walked away after a few minutes, forgetting that that is the way to get the best deal on a thing - and damned if I didn't get that hammock for the ridiculous, rock bottom price I'd offered. Tshirts. Airell bought a dress.

Eventually it was after 10ish and we headed back to the club, weighed down with our piles of crap. Imagine our joy when we found out we could store our crap behind the front desk (there was a hostel upstairs, the front desk was for the club and the hostel).

I decided to do the samba lessons - I did pretty well at it since my head was utterly disconnected from my feet - this is vital for my dancing success.  I danced. I drank a lot of beer. I met people. Did more dancing. Made friends. Practiced my portuguese. Danced some more. Etc.  At midnight the crazy pile of people around the bar magically disappeared.  The rest of the night is mostly a blur.  

Mostly. I will only say that we formalized the 'what happens in Rio' pact the next morning. 

I went home sometime after 3am, well before Justin Bieber Airell.  He'd met his own new friends and heaven knows I was not his keeper and I was exhausted.  Thankfully, the hostel had a pile of business cards in their common area - I was constantly grabbing one before I left so I'd be able to show the address to the driver.  My portuguese and alcohol intake were not to be trusted.  I was short of money for the cab fare so I had to go to the hostel and dig through my wallet and back to the cab with the difference.  

Then I passed out after drinking about 3 gallons of water straight from the tap (they had filtered water but I ignored this). Airell was smarter than me and remembered the stuff we'd left behind the front desk - eventually - I think I remember he had to go back after starting out for the hostel.  I didn't remember it until I saw the bag of crap on the floor next to my bed the next morning.  The room we were in at the time was connected to a private room - I think this was when I met an Australian couple whose names I cannot recall but for some bizarre reason they thought Airell and I were awesome (ok not that bizarre, we are clearly awesome but they figured it out really quickly).  They were staying in the private room connected to our dorm.  

Airell had also signed up for the hang gliding thing - but when I got up and went downstairs the hostel owner informed me that the winds were too high so the hang gliding cliff was closed for the day.

Well dammit. What to do with the day?   

I suppose I should have gone to see the Lapa steps.  I just didn't think of it at the time.  Airell wanted to go see Jesus - and I think I offered to go with him if he wanted company - but I'd have been happy to spend the day on the beach too.

We ended up collecting a couple other people from the hostel to go with us - one named Bruce Lee! For Reals! and another very nice man from France, a doctor? psychiatrist? neurologist? whose name I cannot remember.  We got directions on which bus to take and set off for a bus stop.  Whereupon we waited for quite some time.  Finally! A bus with the number we wanted came flying towards us!

It did not stop despite our frantic waving.  A kind local explained that you needed to read the side of the bus shelters to see which buses actually stop at them. Ahhhh.  So we headed down the street to the next bus shelter and shortly the bus we needed turned up.

When I'd gone up corcovado with Val, we'd done so on the express city tour.  We rode in our bus, transfered to one of the park vans and were driven to the base of an elevator on the backside of Jesus.  Express and quick, certainly.  The guide told us that there was a train from the base of the mountain but you could wait a long time (hours!) to ascend the mountain that way.

That may be true on a weekend or the summer, definitely.  It's not a big train. The bus stopped across the street from the corcovado train station and we got tickets on the next train, in half an hour.  

Just enough time for frozen yogurt if memory serves.  

 The ride up on the train was tantalizing - lots of trees and then incredible vistas, then more trees.  Have I mentioned that Rio is one of the most beautiful cities in the world?  Amazing.

Taken from the train.

From the viewing area on the mountain.  You can see Sugarloaf in the distance.

Artsy Jesus.

It's just what you do there.

I don't remember taking this picture. Huh. That's the rest of the group.  

Bruce and the other guy went to save a spot in line for the train back down while I worked with Airell to collect geocache stuff.  By the time we got to the bottom of the mountain, we were starving.  And there wasn't really a good place to eat near there - we walked quite a way before we came across a little deli.  That had this beauty in the cooler:  

Airell and I split it.  It was pretty good.  

Also got one of these:

Grilled cheese and banana sandwich!  Also good. Weird. But good. Try it if you have the chance.

We debated going up Sugarloaf to watch the sunset - but then it started to rain.  So we got on a bus back to the hostel and I promptly fell asleep.

I woke up when I nearly dropped my phone on the floor.  I must have felt a need to capture the moment forever in the picture above?  How didn't I realize how sick I was at this point - it defies all logic. I never sleep during the day, unless I'm sick and even then it takes time to happen.  I sat down at the back of this bus and just.... fell asleep.  As I am told people do.

That night the guy from France, Airell and a new friend from Austria and I went to some random street somewhere in Rio where the locals go to drink beer. In the street.  I was so tired it almost hurt me - I lasted until 1am-ish and then grabbed a cab back to the hostel with the French guy.  

I wish I remembered his name.  He was nice.  Like oatmeal though.  Glad I went home when I did, the others watched someone get mugged later in the evening.  

I could go on, but the next day deserves its own post - and since it is one year exactly tomorrow, I'll leave it for then.  I wrote this right around this time.  Pretty good window inside my head.  My crazy, crazy head.

Ahhh, Rio

So, when last I wrote we were leaving a sketchy hostel.  After a breakfast on the beach? I feel like we might have wandered out of the hostel for a bit to get something to eat.  Does it matter? No.  So why did I say it? 

Stream of conciousness.  Much more fun to write than it is to read.  (I have an English degree, so I have a far more informed opinion on this than the average person. Oh the horrible things I have read).

(You: what about this crap?)

Heh.

So.  We had a reservation at a hostel that was allegedly not that far from where we were.  (I've looked it up on google maps - apparently 1.2 km. Less than a mile.  

It was too far for Anna's poor suitcase.  Those jagged sidewalk rocks, while pretty, destroyed the wheels on the suitcase.  Luckily I know where I can get a suitcase repaired and it was fixed for about $30.  Doesn't mater what I take there, it's always $30.

We were off to Harmonia Hostel, which is hidden in a courtyard-type sidewalk thing.  There are several hostels in this spot so it took some time to find it.  We were greeted by a lovely lady named Saskia (how do I remember her name?) who did not in fact have our reservation.

Apparently someone forgot to confirm the reservation. I was not making travel arrangements so... I leave it to you to guess. Thankfully they were able to accomodate us - we just had to move all over the hostel throughout our weeklong stay. I stayed in almost every room in that place.

This was fine.  We were given the obligatory hostel tour and the list of rules.

I took a shower as soon as I could.  Sweet bliss.  Then! They had a van heading out to a football game that afternoon - so we went.  What can I say about football in Rio?  

I've often said that Rider fans are the craziest fans around.  They've got nothing on Rio football fans.  There were samba drums going the entire game.  The shouting, the chanting, the singing.  It was awesome.  I recommend a football game in Rio.  No alcohol allowed, which is good.  That's most of the problem with SK fans - they get full of Pilsner and then they're just stupid.

Would I go again? Ehh. Probably not.  You can see some amazing football on the beach in Rio, and you can usually find some people playing footvolley - basically volleyball with a football and you don't use your hands.  Plus is on the beach and free.

The game was late-afternoon, and we got back to the hostel around 7ish.  I remember this because I had made arrangements to skype in to my favorite nephew's birthday party - it was being held at my mom and dad's new house (into which they had not yet moved) and all the family would be there.  

I'd been gone for more than 3 weeks at this point and it just seemed like the thing to do.  Except.  I have rarely used skype.  Once or twice, maybe, and I used an ipad or laptop that had been set up already.  I am not certain I even had a skype account before I hatched this scheme.  I did not have any contacts set up - and when I tried to find my family all I found were a bunch of similar names from Alberta.

That's helpful. Awesome.  

So then I'm texting with family trying to find out their skype usernames - all while chatting with the new people in my room (I was in 4 bed mixed dorm - I was the only girl).  This was how I met Fred, a proper british gentleman on the last leg of a long-term stay in south America.  He was looking for people to go eat some dinner with.  Along came Airell, I introduced them (all while fiddling with the damn laptop) and eventually I got a connection with home.  

Airell and Fred quite politely headed downstairs so I could chat with my family in peace.  

It was weird and lovely talking to the family.  Kids ran in and out of the video, my mom kept asking questions and I started to get a little homesick.

Just a little.

We wrapped up the call after about 15 minutes and I headed downstairs - bless Airell and Fred, they'd been busy talking and had waited for me to go for supper.  Fred had heard about a good churrasco place - so we went for churrasco.

I cannot recall much more of that evening.  The restaurant had little coasters you could place on the table saying more meat! stop meat!, a great salad buffet thing and sweet heaven, the meat was so good there.  I ate myself sick and drank myself stupid.  It was a great evening.

We also met Sarah.  All in all, a good day.

Next day was a Monday. I remember walking from Ipanema to the Copacabana palace hotel with Airell and Fred.  We ate lunch at a salad restaurant that let you pick up to 20 things to put in a salad.

I created this abomination:

It was actually pretty good. Weird as hell, but good.

I remember watching Airell try to barter with a vendor on the beach (he did not win).  I realized that I'd need to adjust my follow-up appointment with the surgeon - I needed bloodwork before the appointment and I? Was not getting home until the night before my scheduled appointment.

So I called and changed the appointment.  Only took 3 or 4 tries.  We had drinks on the beach - with this bit of advice, how could you not?

Airell and Fred wanted to walk through the Copacabana Palace hotel - but were nervous about it.  We hung around outside for a bit until I took charge.  I used the thing I learned from a band teacher back in Junior High - walk in like you own a place, and people assume you belong.

It totally works. Most of the time.  Notably, this time it worked.  Turns out Fred had stayed there with his family back in the day but as it was under construction while we visited it was not the same.

Nice hotel.

It had been a long walk from Ipanema to Copacabana and I cannot lie, I was a little tipsy.  This may have been why we decided to hop on to one of the vans that travel up and down the streets of Rio - I just read a news article that scared the crap out of me - and damn, I won't ride one of those vans again.

It was fine though. No problems and we were soon back in Ipanema at the hostel.  We were going out that night - to a music something-or-other with a local famous band and lots of people.  First was dinner with a bunch of strangers that were soon friends.

We met some new people - people that Fred had already met.  It was a long night, pretty entertaining - but my head was not into fun right then.  It was a weird feeling.  There was wandering around weird back streets of Rio - I think back and realize that was probably pretty stupid - but I'm still here.

Full disclosure - I have no idea what we did on what day after that.  Airell had a friend that was doing an internship in one of the favelas in Rio - Fred wanted to go on a favela tour before he went home to England and was going to pay to go on one.

Airell arranged a walking tour with his friend (who was very ill at the time, if memory serves) and we did that the next day. I think.  Some of the people we'd met at the music thing joined us - they were also from England, but Essex.  If you're from England this apparently means something - I'm told you should think Jersey Shore? If you're into that (which I'm not).  Anyway, very entertaining ladies and I had a good chat with Tahira as we rode another van (Airell's friend wasn't thrilled about the van option) up to the favela.

Look! A facebook picture of the favela tour group eating the best strawberries ever:

Favelas are slums.  The one we went to had recently been through pacification so it was safe.  There were computer shops and shops of all kinds next to what was likely raw sewage flowing down from the shanties built into the side of the mountain.  Fascinating.  We stopped and ate lunch while we were there, catching a bus back to the hostel.  We made plans to go to Rio Scenarium, an admittedly touristy spot but we were told it was worth a visit.  Airell and some of the brits decided to go shopping for some souvenirs that were actually made in Brazil.

Shopping for souvenirs interested me not at all. Instead I went with Sarah to the fruit market and tried (and bought) oodles of fruit.  There are pictures on her blog from that visit.

One of me from facebook - I have no idea what I'm eating but this guy made me do it:

I went for a run on the beach later - the crazy that had taken hold of me the night before hadn't left, and in fact, was getting much worse.  I must have run for miles, stopping every now and again to watch the waves and cry.  While I was off running Airell came looking for me to see if I wanted to go see the Lapa steps since the shopping had been a bust - but I wasn't around so he went with the brits.

I was so tired.  When I got back to the hostel I crawled into my bunk and fell asleep for a while, waking in time to get ready for the night on the town.  I met the group downstairs and we were soon off to a restaurant near the Scenarium.  I was in such a mental state that night. So sad, so glad to be alive, horribly exhausted and did I mention sad?  

I coped with this in a horrible way - I systematically set about drinking as much as I could.

I did very well.  

We met Airell and the brits at the restaurant. I give Airell credit - he felt really bad when he realized I hadn't seen the Lapa steps during my city tour.  And he'd gone without me.  

As he is not my keeper, nor am I his, I was over it pretty quickly.  

Ahh booze. I understand why people self-medicate with it.  I have the gift of being able to stop. I ache for those who can't stop.  

Rio Scenarium.  It's a nightclub? With lots of crazy stuff on the walls. There was a whole wall of clocks.  There were 3 levels.  You paid money to get in and got a piece of paper with a list of drinks on it - you had to show this paper every time you got a drink and they'd mark it down. Lose the paper and you paid a crazy amount of money when you left.  Because at bars in Brazil you pay when you leave.  So there's usually only one way out and that's why people die when there are fires in nightclubs there.

Or so I learned when I got home when that actually happened a few months later.

Live music and dancing at the scenarium.  We hadn't reservations so we were shunted to the top level, which was fine.  We took pictures:

You know why I love this picture? I'm smiling. Sarah (next to me, a guy named Jeff from our hostel is behind us) was always on me about not smiling in pictures - I have a deep seated inability to smile when being photographed (I blame my grandmother, I'll tell that story sometime if I haven't already).  So if you want a smile, you have to make me laugh.

Mission accomplished.  It also helped that I'd had a terrible lot to drink.

We danced. I get a lot better at samba when I've been drinking.  It disconnects my brain from my feet and they actually work a lot better that way.  

We left when they closed down the bar.  

There's a story that I would dearly love to tell right now but I am bound by what happens in Rio stays in Rio.  

That saying was invented in Rio.  Vegas just stole it.  

Believe me.

Anyway, I've gotten through 3 whole days this time.  You'll be pleased to hear that I have only 6 days left to recount on this trip. My goal is to get through this before an entir year has passed.

I have til next Tuesday.

I can do this.

Let me take you to Rio, Rio

Note: I wrote this a week ago, sitting in the Abbotsford airport, slightly disgruntled.  My flight home to Edmonton was delayed. Abbotsford has a cute airport but I don't think I'll fly out of it again if I have the choice.  Little things got on my nerves - no carts to bring your luggage in from the rental car return, the rental car return guy was rather rude and the cart was squeaky.

In the scheme of things, not a big deal, absolutely a first world problem.  But enough that I would choose a different airport in future.  

***

So when last I blathered on incessantly, I believe we got to the airport in Foz, just barely in time for a flight that was delayed.  We waited in Curitiba. We flew on to Rio.  

Last time Val and I had taken a cab from the airport into the city, and it had cost the earth.  As I was now travelling on the cheap with the cheap maestro, we took an air-conditioned bus for about $10.  I may have already explained that Airell did all the travel arranging - the highly recommended hostel he'd been told about was full on Saturday night.  While we'd stopped to grab our bags at the hostel in Foz he'd scanned hostels in the same general vicinity (Ipanema/Copacabana) and found one that had *mixed* reviews.  One said it wasn't bad, the other said it was the dirtiest they'd ever seen.  

We (I mean, mostly Airell) went with the 'how bad could it be?' and booked it.  

So we caught this bus.  When we got on the bus, Airell asked if they could drop us near the address of the hostel.  The driver said sure.

We drove a long time.  Eventually, Airell, who was watching google maps on his phone, decided we'd gone too far and began a long conversation in which he tried to convince the bus driver to drop us off.

Eventually he did.  Half a mile or so after we'd already gone way too far.

So. Imagine this.  We're on the street in front of Leblon beach, and we need to get back to the very far end of Ipanema, 3 blocks from Copacabana.

That's not that far, if you're going for a run in the morning.  It's far if you're carrying a giant backpack or dragging a blue butterfly suitcase. On the jagged sidewalks of Rio:

That's FAR.

I feel compelled to point out that the sidewalk design is not correct for where we were, but you get the idea.  Not exactly smooth trailing for a suitcase.  (Spoiler: I had to get the suitcase fixed before I returned it to my favorite niece named Anna).

(Side note: Annoying guy is at the airport bar.  You know the one. It's his birthday. Makes creepy friends with the waitress and the people next to him. THANK GOD I am not next to him.)

There.  Anyway, there we were in Leblon, needing to get to somewhere in Ipanema, but really not sure exactly where we needed to get to in Ipanema.

So we started walking.  Walking. Walking.  I want to point out that I'd have been fine with walking the whole way, but I was pulling my suitcase, not carrying it on my back so when Airell wanted to catch a cab I was fine with that plan too.

Then the hard part was finding a cab that wasn't already engaged.  This was Leblon. Saturday night. After 10.  Not exactly crawling with cabs.  

We walked for quite a while before we were able to snag a cab.  I cannot recall if it was I or Airell that got it, I'm going to go with me because this is my story and I can tell it however I like.  The driver had no idea where the hostel was (but recognized the address) and spoke limited English.  Out came the phrase book.  

So we began wandering the streets with our driver, looking for the hostel until we finally spotted a giant pirate flag for the Piratas hostel.  

So we dragged our weary selves in.  It's... the second review.  Dirty. Dark. Wouldn't be hard to get high just from standing in the doorway. If you know what I mean.  Full of creepy looking people.  Kitchen piled with dirty dishes about 3 feet deep (wish I were kidding about that).  So we get in there, and we wait for the dude who will show us to our bunks for the night.  There's a room off to the side of the hallway we were waiting in that was dark and seemed to be full of huddled bodies, pillows, possibly mattresses and sleeping bags.  Everywhere.  

I leave you to draw your own conclusions about that room.  I was there and I'm not really sure what conclusions to draw from it.  There was a general feeling of skudge everywhere.  The hammocks in the hallway were lovely, though.  But you have to get the hammocks right in Brazil.

Airell was already looking for another place to stay for the night.  We hadn't even seen our spot and he'd been skeeved right off.  He was apologetic and I? Was terribly amused.  Eventually the dude who takes the money showed up and took our money (about $12CAD for the night - about $8 too much), showed us to our spots and we were even more skeeved.  

I'll simply put it like this.  Had that been the first hostel we'd gone to, I'd have said 'See ya!' to Airell and moved into the Copacobana Palace at $400+ per night and seen him when I got back to Edmonton.  It was the sort of place you never, ever tell your mother about.  (Don't tell my mother!) There was a bucket next to one of the ladies toilets that was collecting... water? I think? It was overflowing and I mostly chose not to think about it. You had to be careful how you perched on the toilet so it wouldn't fall over.  Airell told me the mens was too unspeakable for words.  We both chose to leave the place in the morning without a shower.  I don't think we'd have gotten any cleaner anyway. 

After we'd seen our bunks (horrors. Horrors. HORRORS. Danger at every turn! From every direction! Of every kind!) we went back downstairs to collect our bags.  The money dude was on his way out, but offered some advice for something to do that night.

It was after 11pm at this point.  At home, I'm normally thinking about heading to bed at that time.  Am old.  Am ok with that.  BUT! Was in Rio! Carousing is required!!

Anyway, the money dude told us about a samba school that was doing a kind of voting process for the song the school would perform for Carnaval.  He said it was one of the best things to do on a Saturday night - and he kept trying to get people at the hostel to go but they were all so hungover from Friday night's carousing that noone ever took him up on it.

I'd read about the samba schools and the practicing in a guide book, and that you could go see this starting in September, and we were nearly to September, so I was up for it.  We got an address from the hostel guy, the name of the samba school and then carried our stuff up to the bunks.

I can't even with those bunks.  Really.  It was dark so you could imagine it was better than it was but I still didn't want to spend any more time in there than I absolutely had to.  Airell? Felt the same.  I grabbed some money, perhaps changed into something different, locked my valuables in his backpack and we left that scary, scary place.  We were both hungry (thirsty!) so we headed for something to eat - settling on one of the restaurants under a tent on the sidewalk in front of the beach.  Maybe we ate pizza? I know we drank beer and plotted how we could find a better, i.e. lower disease potential place for the night.  There were hotels nearby.  How bad could they be?

We traipsed into the Intercontinental? Maybe? I might have made that name up.  Anyway, it was big, it was fancy and it was going to cost $700 per night.  USD.  

Sweet jumping jellyfish.  The night was half over and dammit, if I am paying that much for a room I'm going to enjoy the damn room.  We somehow backed out of paying for the room on the spot and somehow got ourselves out of the hotel without getting arrested for mischief. 

Whereupon we howled with laughter and an excess of beer. And decided that since the hostel was so nasty - either we go back there and spend the night hugging our bags to keep them safe or we go to the samba school thing on the other side of town.

We chose the samba school.  

I have vague recollections of Rio spinning by me outside the taxi window and being dropped outside a random building with people and vendors all around it.  Walking in and not having to pay a cover fee.

I have pictures. I had video, even.  But damned if I can find the video.

The picture is not that inspiring, really.  See, what happens is different groups within the school have a song they'd like to do for Carnaval.  Each group performs their song, and all the supporters of that song dance and since along, and wave those flags you can see in the picture.  This building was huge - must have been 1000 people in there.  So they'd play the song, the drums would play and people would drink and the flags would wave.  When the music was at normal speed.

When each song did the mandatory kick up to double time (triple time? it was that fast) I kid you not, the whole damn room exploded into the most elaborate, incredible demonstration of samba I have ever seen.  That stupid show Val and I had gone to? 

Nothing compared to this.  Incredible.  

We watched, drank and maybe even tried a little samba ourselves (I look like a spastic monkey on crack when I try to samba, I can sorta do it, but damn. Rhythm I may have in a theoretical sense. Possession of my extremities and rhythm at the same time? No, I do not have that).

We rolled back into the creepy hostel sometime after 4? 5? Who the hell knows.  Airell, that clever soul, had written the address and name of the hostel on 2 pieces of paper, one for each of us, so we'd know where the hell we needed to get back to.

This plan worked.  At least, it worked because Airell didn't lose his little piece of paper.  No idea what happened to mine.  Maybe got lost in the nasty ass bathrooms at the samba school - think no doors, a screaming woman policing the toilet paper and... stuff.... flowing on the floors.

Good thing I was already drunk. At the time I didn't care.  Sure! I'll pee with the door open! Wait, the door isn't open, there is no door! Whatever!  That's just water on the floor!!!  That screaming woman isn't mad, she's just really excited about toilet paper.

When we got back to our bunks, I discovered someone was sleeping in the one I'd been told was mine (bottom bunk, I claimed age, cancer, girl, whatever, I was not climbing up to a top bunk anymore the end) so I just chose a random bed nearby with noone in it and promptly passed out  while clutching my most valued valuables (combination of being really, very ill and very drunk).

When I woke in the morning... well, I'm pretty smart about drinking these days, so I'd had a lot of water before I went to bed.  Straight from the tap in that nasty ass kitchen, no less.  How did I not get every water-borne illness known to heaven and earth in there?  Regardless, no hangovers for me.  The first sight of the bed I slept in with the unforgiving morning light?

I prefer not to think about that.  

Sweet heavenly Christmas.  

Let us never speak of that again.  

Anyway. It didn't matter. Rio was about to get much, much better. 

Don't cry for me

OK, OK. I know. Cheesy title. HAVE YOU BEEN TO ARGENTINA?

No? When you have, then you can judge me.  Otherwise, don't cry to me.

Heh.

***

Next morning, after a great sleep on another not-as-bad-as-you'd-think bunkbed mattress and an excellent breakfast we handed over our passports to a random man who would be driving us in his van to Argentina.  He would be the one to clear us through Argentinian customs. We would not actually have to get out of the van or speak to a border guard. In retrospect this seems a bit weird. At the time, ehh. Whatever.  We asked if we could get stamps in our passports and were told that they didn't usually stamp passports for day trippers.  Bummer.

We were at the Argentinian border in fairly short order.  Our dude went in and we waited outside the van, staring across the fences towards the country next door.  He returned, we crawled back into the van and our passports were returned to us.

Much to our joy, our passports had been stamped.  Our driver said he had a friend in customs that did him a favor.

I now suspect this was all a ploy to improve his tip at the end of the day. Which? Did I give him one? Oops.

We had the option of going to some shops, seeing the spot where three countries meet over a couple of rivers or heading straight to the Argentinian falls.  The couple that I cannot remember much about needed to catch a bus or something later in the afternoon, and none of us were really interested in shopping anyway, so we headed straight for the tri-border.

This is where Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay meet at the confluence of 2 rivers, the Iguazu and Parana.

 There's a whitish smudge to the left of me in this picture - that's either Paraguay or Argentina. I think Paraguay but I would not swear to that in court.  Wait. I could erase this but my brain just kicked in - I was in Argentina, so that has to be Paraguay. Brazil is on the bank to my right that you cannot see. 

You can only look at a couple of rivers and 3 countries for so long, so we were shortly back in the van headed for the Argentinian park.

Our dude made plans for where/when he would meet us, he purchased our tickets for the park and the 6 of us set off.  I didn't expect that we'd stick together the way we did, but I really enjoyed the day. I daresay I made some new friends.

So Nick had said that the Argentinian side was very different from the experience on the Brazilian side of the falls, more intimate. I was skeptical. It's just falling water - pretty falling water, but still. Falling water. 

I was wrong.  It was a completely different experience to visit the falls on this side - that few hour trip a couple of weeks before really was insane.  I am sad Val didn't get to experience this - it was amazing.

You were literally amongst the falls in Argentina. 

There are rainbows.

You may will get wet.

There was another jet boat ride - and because I am crazy, I did it again.  It was a hot sunny day and I figured I'd dry out fairly quickly.

Plus, I got to see this:

Wild impatiens growing on the side of a sheer rock wall. Amazing.

We saw butterflies:

Lots of butterflies:

 

Many butterflies:

We rode a train. I recall eating some sort of Argentinian sandwich thing Airell bought.  It was a great day.

(Full disclosure: I wrote a whole lot more about Argentina and the falls but it got lost when my computer crapped its pants. Your loss? Haha! Your win!)

I will say that it absolutely killed me to be in Argentina and not be able to sing the song.  I'd sung when I was on the other side with Val.  In the 10 days or so between visits to Iguassu something had happened to my throat - my doctor later told me it was scar tissue causing the problem.  I could hit notes, but I could not stay on them.  

I always say everyone can sing - but not everyone can sing well.  I could have kept singing but I could hear how bad I sounded - and that just drove me nuts.

So I didn't sing.  Stupid cancer.

We left the park as it was closing (at least, all the people were leaving) and headed back to the hostel.  We made plans to go for dinner at a churrasco restaurant Nick had recommended with Jenny and Thomas - but first it was time for napping.  And marvelling over how intricately the laundry service had folded my underwear. 

I was not aware underwear could be folded like that.

We met up in the bar, where I successfully drank the bar dry of the ingredients for the favela special.  (Proud Canadian moment right there. Full disclosure: it was almost gone when I started). 

It was a long walk to the churrasco restaurant, but we were led by a friend of Nick's.  I'd already had churrasco in Brazil, and before that I'd stayed at a resort in the Dominican Republic with a Brazilian a la carte restaurant.  This place wasn't fancy, but damn, was it good.  I suppose any place where smiling waiters come up to your table offering slices of meat impaled on a sword would be good.  At least for entertainment value.  Over dinner we laid plans to visit Itaipu dam and the Brazilian side - we considered Paraguay but since we had a flight to catch at 4:30 pm we thought that mightn't be a good idea.

Next morning we loaded ourselves onto a public bus, bound for the main station for a bus that would take us out to the dam.  Jenny spoke decent portuguese, and that along with a student group filming a video, or perhaps doing a survey of tourists, got us onto the correct bus.  It was cool and windy day and I was suffering from the beginning of severe undersupply of thyroid hormone. At the time I couldn't figure out why I felt so crappy - I can't have been great company. In retrospect, good grief, how stupid am I?

(Don't answer that).

Itaipu dam is big and spans the Parana river between Brazil and Paraguay.  The power generated here is meant for Paraguay and Brazil, but is apparently mostly exported to Brazil.  There's a video they show before you start the bus tour that was not too far short of a cult indoctrination video. Brazil! Power! Ecology! Environment! Good! Excellent! Rah! Brazil! Brazil! Brazil!  

It's a bit like I imagine the world felt when they watched Canada beat the USA in the men's hockey in Vancouver nearly 4 years ago.  Awesome for us, for everyone else, ehh. Whatever. (Except perhaps the USA).

That's pretty much the long and the short of the video.  The bus tour was interesting - the guides said everything in 3 languages - portuguese, spanish and english.  I told the others my lame dam jokes about going to the hoover dam, taking the dam tour, riding the dam elevator, buying dam souvenirs, eating a dam hotdog, etc and that I hoped the guides would make the same joke.

I suppose that would be a bit too much to ask in 3 languages.  I still think it is funny.

Am all about the classy humour.

Look!  A dam picture or three:

Yeah yeah, enough dam pictures.  I like a good dam as much as the next person, but the person I couldn't stop thinking about while I was on the tour - my brother-in-law.  He makes his family visit every dam they drive near (I think he plans the routes based on dam tours they can take).  

I think he'd have been way more impressed by the dam than I was. And I was fairly impressed.  I took pictures of it that upond reflection, I realize I have never shown him. 

Tour over, we needed to get back to the hostel to grab our bags and head for the Brazilian park.  We stashed our bags in a locker at the visitors centre and hopped on a bus that would take us to the falls.

It's a 15 minute bus ride.  Not sure if I said that last time.  Anyway, you can ride the bus right up to the falls or get off and hike along the canyon.  Time before, we rode the bus.  This time, we walked.

I think I preferred the walking.  

I don't need to say much more about the falls. Been there, done that. Amazing. Incredible. Everyone should go see them, and more people need to hear about them.  

The most important thing? It was 3:30 (ish) when Airell and I decided we should go catch a bus back to the entrance. We said farewell to Jenny and Thomas (made plans and exchanged contact info to meet up in Rio the next weekend) and started walking quickly to the bus station.

We got on a bus that seemed to wait forever.  Then it stopped all the time.  Time? Was back to moving really, really fast. I think the bus maybe started moving to the park entrance at about 10 to 4.

We made a plan - Airell would hail a cab, I would collect the bags. Or similar.  Time? 

Was of the essence.  The airport was only a 5 minute drive away, but damn. It was already after 4 and our flight was supposed to leave at 430.

We got to the cab, and based on our experience in Curitiba, we knew the word for fast fast fast in portuguese.

Our driver?

Was fast.  He blew by a cop car and I thought, oh Lord, we're done for.

He got on his phone, called the cop, explained the situation and it was all good.

I swear I am not making that up.  

We tipped him well.

We ran into the airport, dashing for the Gol counter. There was a sign at the check-in. Our flight?

Was delayed.

Yay!

Also, dammit. We could have gotten the last clue for the geocache after all.

Wait. I mean, now there was time to relax. Or apply additional deodorant.  

We were booked with Gol to Curitiba, with a layover until our Tam flight to Rio de Janeiro.  I think switching airlines had something to do with Airell's Brazil airpass.   

Ahh, Rio. I was going back. It was Saturday night.  The last Saturday night I'd spent there had been at the stupidest show in the history of stupid shows.

This Saturday? 

So. Much. Better. Also?

It continued well into Sunday. 

But that will have to wait until next time.

Favela chic

Ahh. We'd made it to the plane.

I relaxed so hard after that bit of crazy that I think I fell asleep.  It's a short hop from Curitiba to Foz so very shortly I was back in the weird little city of Iguassu.  

For some reason I think I'd made the reservation for the hostel, based on a recommendation Airell had gotten from another traveler.  This was the first and last bit of accomodation arranging I managed. After this it was all Airell.  

Favela Chic had been open for less than 6 months when we arrived. It's owned by an English guy named Nick who'd married a Brazilian girl and was looking for a business to make a living.

He's doing a great job.  We walked in the door, he greeted us at the desk and I'm not even kidding, it was like you were sitting down with an old friend you hadn't seen in 10 years.  (I've very recently done just that so I know of what I speak).  The normal check-in process in a hotel is clinical, business-like and you may chat with the staff or you may not.  That's ok, that's kind of the point of a hotel.  A good hotel will have someone at the front desk who knows when to chat and when not to chat. You can't ask for much more than that. 

 I'd never stayed in really great hostel before.  Just dodgy ones or deserted ones, so I wasn't impressed with the genre. But! As I've said before, if you're travelling with someone nice enough to let you travel with them without a lot of notice - you just don't make yourself a pain in the ass.

At least you try not to make yourself a pain in the ass.  I make no guarantees or promises when you're a little soft in the head and becoming very ill indeed.

(Yeesh with the damn digressions).

So, Favela Chic? Great hostel.  I just popped onto hostelbookers (been spending a fair bit of time there lately since I think I want to pay for a better seat on the airplane to Europe and make up for it by staying in cheap places) and the total price for a 1 night stay per person, in the 13 bed mixed dorm with 2 baths is presently $13.57. CAD. This includes a hot English-style (think sausages, eggs and tomatoes) cooked breakfast.

Hot diggity damn.  

Breakfast got cooked off to the right.  You could camp up in the space behind the picnic table. Current price is about $5 CAD night.

I think we sat and chatted with Nick for the better part of an hour.  He explained how the hostel functioned, pointed out the bar in the next (outdoor) room and let us know about a tour heading to the Argentinian side of the falls the next morning.  For a low, low price he'd get us in the van and across the border.  There were 4 other people signed up and there was room for the 2 of us.

Naturally we signed up.

Nick assumed we'd never seen the falls - I explained that my general unplanning had led me to come back to Iguassu, so I'd seen the Brazilian side.  He told me that Argentina would be a much more intimate experience.

It's a waterfall, I thought, but alrighty then.

We paid for our stay and then our conversation ranged far and wide. Up and down.  The location of the bar with live music down the road.  The best place to get some cash and a kilo restaurant at the grocery down another road.  How exactly those crazy Brazilian showers actually worked. Namely - that little plastic gadget where the water comes out? Is actually a wimpy on-demand water heater. Will heat water, but not very much at a time.  THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN HELPFUL INFORMATION EARLIER. We talked philosophy. Etc.  At some point Nick suggested that we were American.

I think it was the sidelong incredulous glance that Airell and I shared at that moment that clued Nick in.  We admitted to being Canadian (with a certain amount of mock horror that we'd been tagged as Americans) and Nick fell all over himself apologizing. 

It was funny simply because of how mortified he was by his mistake.  Also he fancied himself as being quite good with accents so he was bothered he hadn't picked ours up.  

This led to a conversation about north American accents, accents in general and eventually Nick said, 'Canadians.  You're all so great but crazy.'

Why yes we are, but why do you say that?

Some time back, there had been a group of Canadians staying at the hostel.  Remember the in-house bar?  The Canadian party (6 -9 people, maybe?) had drank him dry.  He was flabbergasted by how we Canadians could pack it away.

Heh.  Without missing a beat Airell and I turned to each other and said, 'Challenge Accepted.' The pride of our country at stake.

So eventually Nick wanted to go home (he'd literally just hired some help, this was the first night he was going home to be with his family) and he showed us to the dorm.  Bottom bunks again, since the place wasn't full.  Excellent. 

Now, it was getting on into the evening, and we hadn't eaten since the leftover fruit in the bus station in Paranagua (except for airplane snacks) and Nick had told us the kilo restaurant in the grocery store closed at 9.  

I was extremely happy to be reunited with my things.  There's nothing like living out of the equivalent of 2 Safeway bags for 2 days to make you thankful for the acres of space (and the things in that space) in a 24" suitcase.  Especially when one of your Safeway bags was filled with the ridiculous pile of prescription and non-prescription meds I needed to be taking.

It was good to see my stuff again, despite the fact most of it was dirty.

***

OK, another digression.  I finally knew for sure that Brazil was happening on a Tuesday afternoon. We were leaving for the airport at 10pm on Thursday. I could not carry my suitcase - in fact, I placed it open in the back of my car and carried my things to it. For reals.  I packed extremely light since Val was going to be carrying my bag. Val? Left Edmonton with 49.5lb of luggage.  We respond to stress packing in different ways, I suppose. The funny thing is that almost every picture I have of Val has her wearing the same butterfly t-shirt. Haha!  She packed for the conference, so she looked good there. And we really had no plan for what we were doing after the meeting.  

I didn't have a lot of choice in clothing. I packed for 2 weeks, and I packed planning to wash clothing as we travelled. I did buy a couple pairs of jeans in Miami, and a pink flowered tank-top. One pair of jeans went home with Val.  How exactly I would wash my clothes I could not tell you, other than a vague collection of Tide single serve sink detergents in my makeup bag.  I did use them. Once. It sucked.

Favela Chic had a deal with a laundry service - they pick it up, wash it, and return to you at the end of the next day. Cost was per pound of laundry.  I think I sent everything I had (and I'd just sent out laundry in Bonito) except for what was actually on me.  My clothes were returned, as promised, the next day, folded in ways I didn't think clothing could be folded.  Worth the money just to see the folding.

***

OK.  Back to the hostel. I didn't have a lot of stuff to choose from to change into, I may have showered quickly but as per usual, I was ready to go way before Airell was.  

Did I mention the bar that was right there in the hostel? The one below?

There were a pile of interesting looking people over there, and dammit, I've been told the people you meet in them are the reason hostels exist so.... I waded into the group of people and I cannot tell a lie, that group of people sold me on the hostel life.

Nick had developed a drink called the Favela special (could not begin to tell you what it was concocted from) so that became my drink of choice.  Met all the requirements by being tasty and suitably boozy.  And! Not that night, but the next, I did in fact succeed in drinking the bar dry. They ran out of the ingredients for the favela special.

I've never been prouder to be Canadian.

There were 6 other people at the bar, and God bless them, they were the friendliest and most interesting 6 people I'd met in a long time.  

They were a couple from Switzerland on their gap year, making their way around the world (using a fancy airpass from a European airline that let them flit from place to place all over the world, simply, I think, because they were young. I chatted with them for ages since the sheer enormity of the trip they'd undertaken blew my mind.  They were catching a bus the next morning and riding to a friend of a friend's relative to stay).  Another couple that was older than 'just graduated from high school' and were making their way around South America, they went with us to the Argentinian Falls the next day but I could not tell you more about them. Or where they were from.  She had long dark hair.  The other couple was from England. She (Jenny) was in Iguassu for a conference, he (Thomas) had come along for the trip. They lived in Rio, where Jenny was doing a post-doc in green chemistry.  Thomas was working as a tutor in English but is an archaeologist by training.  They had snagged the coolest hotel/hostel/guesthouse room ever - an old van with a mattress inside.  Favela chic indeed.

 More hammocks. Heaven.

And a tree, around which they'd built the hostel. I loved that place.

My job is one of the best ice breakers there is.  When I'm asked what I do for a living, my standard answer is 'Chicken Scientist.'

This is often met by blank, incredulous stares, followed by laughter (with me, usually not at me) and a barrage of questions.  Airell is a grad student also working with chickens, but being younger and hipper than I, preferred to say that he was studying animal science.

Chickens have taken me all over the world and afford me the priviliged lifestyle I lead, so I give the chickens their due. I?

Am a chicken scientist. And proud of it.

I'll be honest.  It's not always been my default to jump into social situations like that.  There was a time I hated it.  How do you know what to say? Keep the conversation going? Think of interesting things to say to people? 

Well you know what?  I've learned, from ever extending experience that the best way to be a great conversationalist? Is to ask questions.  Listen to what the people say, and find a follow-up question.  You really don't have to say much at all.  And!  You can get to know people very quickly. Is awesome. WHERE WAS THIS KNOWLEDGE WHEN I WAS 20?

Oh. Right.  I still had my head up my ass when I was 20. 

As did we all?

Anyway, by the time Airell finished making himself beautiful (did I ever mention people have thought he's Justin Bieber? No? Well, is true.  I went to school with Justin Bieber's uncle Rob (in 1992-93!) and now I was travelling with someone who I'm told looks like Justin. Weird). I had made friends with everyone at the bar, established myself as a hilarious yet quirky chicken scientist with a well-developed sense of the ridiculous and downed at least a couple of drinks in short order.

I think Airell was somewhat bewildered by how quickly I adjusted to the hostel lifestyle. I introduced him to the people who'd be going to Argentina with us the next day, we explained (again) that we were merely friends that worked together (this also blew people's minds) and he settled in for a drink himself.  

That was another good evening.  Eventually I realized I. Was. Starving.  It was about 830 and the restaurant closed at 9 so time was of the essence.  I excused myself from the Swiss couple and told Airell I was going to get something to eat.  He decided to come with and we set off through a rather dodgy looking neighborhood to the kilo restaurant.  Everything looks dodgier at night - we had no problems and by daylight the next day it all looked normal.  

The kilo restaurant? Was ok.  It was just before closing so you couldn't expect much. We were also in a grocery store so... not exactly high class. We got some cash, maybe some snack food at the grocery side before we left and headed back to the hostel.  

We might have gone back to the bar, we might have gone straight to bed. Does it matter? No.  It had been a weird ass crazy, but awesome day.  And the next day? Was going to get even better. For we were going to Argentina.

For the day.

As you do.

more honey

When last I was boring any potential readers with the longest travel log in the history of travel logs, I'd just had a mountaintop experience.

Well, you can't stay on top of the mountain forever, so eventually I carried on (or perhaps the others caught up to me?) to the beach on the other side of the hills.  Now is as good as time as any - so let me tell you that Paranagua, the city where we caught the boat that got us to the island, has an extremely busy port.  We didn't actually see that port, we were in a completely different spot (I think) but we could see the evidence of a busy port.  That evidence was present in the dozens of huge container ships you could see throughout the horizon.  That doesn't sound terribly impressive - but I tried counting the ships I could see (and many were miles out from shore) and lost count at 36.  

When you sat on the deck of our hostel (on the other side of the island from the beach), there was a stready stream of ships coming and going from the port in Paranagua.  

So, we had hiked the hill and descended to another amazing beach.  The sun had come out over the course of the morning and the ocean was demanding that we swim in it.  The three of us had that beach to mostly to ourselves; a couple other groups came and went but there were no more than 8 people at any one time.  Awesome.  

We'd been carrying one of those giant bottles of beer, (it had travelled by plane, train, etc from Bonito, I think) and it was starting to get warm in Airell's backpack after spending the night in the hostel fridge.  The beer was wet, the ocean was cool, the sun was hot.  Best day ever.  Cannot tell a lie - I didn't want to leave the island the next day.

I don't have any pictures from our time on that beach.  I don't really need them - I can remember the feel of the sun on my back and the wind in my hair.  It was good.  We did get surprised by a rogue wave at one point - I saw it coming but didn't have time to warn the others.  It wasn't big or dangerous - just got their stuff wet.  

Eventually it was past time for lunch, and damn. We were hungry.  Our original plan for the day had been to hike over to the lighthouse and then go on towards the fort.   Instead, we headed toward Brasilia, following a sign and a track that went through the jungle.  We didn't see a lot of people and we saw the odd pousada - but we were getting hungrier by the moment.  We'd heard there were places to eat in Brasilia but we had no idea how much further we had to walk.  And then! We met a lady carrying a basket. In portuguese, I believe she asked if we were hungry, and if we'd buy one of her pastries.   Her basket was full of pastries - still hot pastries.  I considered for a moment, a mere moment, the wisdom of buying food from a random woman that appeared from nowhere with food for sale when we were starving.  Call me crazy, but I also thought that was so awesome that we HAD to buy some pastries.

I don't remember what they were called but I tell you truly, I've never eaten a better meal - mine was filled with bananas and caramel and set me back no more than $3R.

Sustained, we carried on to Brasilia.  Lots of pousadas, a restaurant or three, some teeny shops, a post office and a place where you could rent a bicycle.  I think we stopped and had another drink and watched the world go slowly by.  

It was getting late.  We could have certainly walked back the way we came - but it had taken hours to walk as far as we had - even without stopping we wouldn't have been back to Encantadas before nightfall.  We didn't have a flashlight so... not such a good idea.  Luckily there is a boat that leaves every hour or so between Brasilia and Encantadas - cheap and quick.

You get great views of the island.  That up there is the lighthouse.  

I said it already, but Ilha do Mel just got to me.  I didn't want to leave - and my companions felt the same way.  We hadn't gotten to the lighthouse or the fort - and we were going to need to leave the island by 1pm the next day if we wanted to catch our flight.  We considered changing our flights but it was too expensive.  Or not available.

So we made a plan.  We'd get up early, catch the boat to Brasilia, rent bikes and use them to cover the distance quickly.  An excellent plan.  So I settled in with my kindle on the deck.

Sunset. Beach. Good.

Amazing how much the tide came in - it came almost to the edge of the deck.

We'd been told about a good restaurant down the beach - it had a green light, we'd seen it the night before but tonight? No green light.  

We picked one and set about eating and drinking. Again.  Julie was amazed by our ability to pack away the booze.  In retrospect, I am also amazed by how much booze I packed away.  When you're escaping from reality - it just seems normal.  We stayed up late, drinking and setting the world to rights.  Well, as much as I and a couple 20-somethings could agree to set the world to rights.  It was fun.  And Airell demonstrated his ability to fall asleep anywhere, at any time.  Even in the middle of a sentence.  

(There may be photo evidence of this.  There may not be photo evidence of this). 

For someone like me that has struggled with insomnia THEIR ENTIRE LIFE, that is a gift worth being jealous of.  In Brazil though? I didn't have any trouble falling asleep. I expect the alcohol I was sucking back had something to do with that, but I was also still recovering AND I was becoming increasingly undersupplied with thyroid hormone.

Post-surgery, I was put on a standard dose of .1mg of synthroid.  At the moment, one year later, my dose has more than doubled to .225mg.  

So the next morning it is fair to say that we weren't moving very fast.  Now I learned long, long ago (shortly after I turned 25) that I cannot drink and expect to function the next morning without at least matching my alcohol intake with an equal amount of water.  So while I may have drank hard, I also took in a lot of water.  

This meant a lot of middle of the night trips to the bathroom, in darkened hostel hallways, never knowing who or what you might meet. Heh.

So, it's the next morning. We were going to get up early.  I think I might have been up early, but my fair companions were not so ambitious.  We didn't get on the boat until hours after we'd planned.  I assumed we wouldn't have time for the lighthouse and the fort. Even with the bike.  It was hot, since I'd been sick I was in dreadful shape, and I hadn't ridden a damn bike in at least 10 years.  

See, when the herniated disc in my back was at its worst my doctor told me that riding a bike, for fitness or whatever, was not a good idea.  I really took that to heart.  This morning though, I wanted to see the lighthouse, I didn't really care about the fort, but damn, I wanted to go to the lighthouse.  I have a thing for lighthouses.  So we caught the boat, got to Brasilia and wandered over to the bike rental place.  Rented the bikes, I adjusted the seat on my bike and we were off.

Let me just say, the best place to ride a bike after >10 year hiatus?

Would not be Ilha do Mel, land of deep sandy paths and tree roots crossing the paths.  

For the shape I was in, I actually did pretty well.  I was mentally congratulating myself for mostly keeping up with the younguns when I came around a corner and saw a wee bridge next to a tree, surrounded by brambles.  To go across the bridge (which was the equivalent of 4 fenceposts laid down next to each other) you had to actually make a fairly sharp turn.

Airell was ahead of me but unfortunately Julie was behind me.  So she got the special show of me trying to make the turn, failing miserably, catching the bike wheel on the bridge and me landing in the brambles.

I got up, bleeding quite profusely from the thorns in my leg - it had lodged so deep it didn't actually come out until I dug it out (on the flight home a couple weeks later).  I have a scar to this day.  

Bless Julie's heart though, she didn't laugh.  At least not for long.

I picked myself up, got back on the bike (after walking it across the bridge) and rode the rest of the way to the lighthouse.  

Rode as far as we could, then we climbed the steps. So many steps. It was hot and I was exhausted.

But totally worth it.  Such a pretty spot.  Have I mentioned I have a thing for lighthouses?

I was keeping track of the time - and we were already pushing it to catch a boat back to Encantadas, and continue on to the boat to take us to the mainland - and get ourselves to the airport in Curitiba.

I didn't think we had time for the fort.  

I was wrong.

I do not recall when the fort was built. 1700s?  It was winter when I visited and it seemed hot outside.  To have to work and guard the place? Damn.  I didn't stay at the fort for long, I knew I had a long ride back to Brasilia:

I think we had to ride back to that dark smudge in the middle of the picture.  Couple of miles at least.  I needed a head start so I wasn't the reason we missed the damn boat.

Don't I look like someone who rides a bike all the time?  

So darn pretty there.

I made a wrong turn on my way back, so I had to back track. Signage? Not so much of that on the island.  I rode back part way with Julie and we had to wait for Airell.  He'd decided to climb the damn hill behind the fort.  We returned the bikes, ran for the boat to Brasilia.  By the time we got to Brasilia - we were really short on time.  We ran back to the hostel, threw our stuff into our bags and left.

Well. I did those things.  My 20-something companions?

Stopped for showers.  

I would be irritated, but I? Bought souvenirs on my way to the boat.  I applied more deodorant, so I figured it'd all be good.  Also. 

I did not want to be the reason we missed the damn boat.  So I ran ahead, got on the boat and with my limited portuguese, managed to tell the captain that there were 2 more people coming, and could he wait?

He did.  

Airell was the last to arrive, having spent time making himself all beautiful.  That's the difference between 20-something and 37.  Or between him and I.  

When we got back to the mainland we needed to find the bus station.  There weren't many english speakers, and this was beyond Julie's portuguese.  We found a taxi and eventually, the bus station.  Had a brief terror moment when I put my bag in the trunk and then couldn't find my passport.  Which I needed to get on the plane.  Different to have to stay when you want to, another if you can't travel without your passport.

Spoiler: found passport

We bought tickets on the bus that was leaving in about 45 minutes and ate the rest of the fruit and other food we'd bought on the island.  

Now. I knew it was a couple hour bus ride to Curitiba.  Based on the time the bus was leaving, I figured we had enough time to get to the bus station and catch a cab/shuttle to the airport.  The first part of the journey was lovely - the same area we'd crossed by train - we crossed by bus.  

If it were an express bus we'd have made it to Curitiba in plenty of time. Instead? We got a bus that stopped at every widening in the road to pick up and drop off people.  Mein Gott.  You know when you're watching the clock and you want something to come quickly and the clock CRAWLS?  The opposite is true when you see the time for your flight ticking ever closer.

We got to the bus station in Curitiba about an hour before our flight was due to leave.  It's a 15-20-30 minute ride to the airport.  I? Had to find the locker with my suitcase.  I'd written down the number and I had the key.  Easy peasy.  

Except.  I got into the bus station and nothing, I repeat nothing, looked familiar.  There were lockers - but not my locker.  You know that feeling you get when things are going very, very wrong? 

Multiply by 1000, and then you might be in the same hemisphere as what I was feeling.  I didn't want to be the reason we missed the damn plane.  Do no harm, and all that.  I actually started wondering if we had come to a different bus station. And eff. What the hell was I going to do then?

I noticed that the locker numbers were moving towards the one I needed as I ran frantically through the bus station.  The joy I felt when the station started seeming familiar? 

Unbounded.

I found my locker, inserted my key and.....

NOTHING.

WHAT. 

THE. 

EFFING.

EFF.

I approached the newsagent shop across the hall and found the same girl that had sold me my token.  Somehow I explained, mostly through frantic signs, that my locker wasn't working.  She called security.  

At this point I was levitating.  

The security guy showed up. So it turns out that I'd needed to pay more to leave my suitcase there for a couple of days, and they'd put a special block on the locker.  They had to go call another guy to get the special key.  Once I'd paid the newsagent lady for the extra days on the damn locker.

I opened my phrase book to look up the words for FAST PLEASE PLANE MUST CATCH PLEASE FAST FAST FAST.

Time? Was moving much too quickly.  I am getting freaked out just writing about this.  

The guy with the special key came, unlocked my suitcase, I threw an obrigada over my shoulder as I grabbed my suitcase and made tracks for the taxis stand, where I was to meet Airell and Julie.  

We bade farewell to Julie and met our driver.  We told him we needed to catch a flight that left at 5:50.

I want to say it was about 5:10 at this point.  And the airport was 15-20-30 minutes away.  

EFF.

The taxi driver lifted his eyebrows and promised us... fast.  

I don't need to go on the Amazing Race because that taxi ride was how I imagine the entire race would feel.  

Gah.  Airell asked me at one point if that was what the Amazing Race was like - he'd never watched it. 'Yes,' I said, 'Yes it is.'

 We got to the airport in about 20 minutes. Our flight was to take off in that much time. 

EFF.

We paid the taxi - and RAN.  

Got to the Gol counter, it was deserted of passengers but many employees - some at the entrance to the line maze who asked where we were headed.

Iguassu, we panted.

Eyebrows lifted.

Foz!

Foz!

Foz!

Everyone seemed to be chanting Foz!

We got to the desks, they took our bags, gave us boarding passes and pointed us to security.  

We RAN.

Security had no lineups.  The security guy hit on me.

Seriously? I'm getting on a damn plane. How is that a good strategy?

(It's funny. I had no recollection of that security guy a few moments ago.  But since I'm kinda traveling through this trip in a real-time kind of way - I keep remembering random weird stuff I've forgotten. Heh.) 

We got to the gate.  The signs were flashing 'Last Call'

We RAN.

They took our boarding cards (and I may I pause here, again, in an already too damn long entry, to note that they always ripped the end off your boarding pass as you went through the gate.  This is not exciting or anything, but they would then take the pile of cards and move a couple feet to the podium and then scan each teeny slip of paper in a batch. I'm sorry, but that just seems silly. Also inefficient).

DAMN. WE WERE GOING TO CATCH THE PLANE.

The relief was palpable.

Palpable, I tell you. 

The design of the airport was such that you went down the gangway, but there were windows and you could see the luggage being loaded.  We were both watching to see if our bags were going to make it - we didn't see them on the carts.

However.

Coming out from the bowels of the airport were 2 people.  Carrying, by hand, our luggage. Airell's giant backpack and my (Anna's) blue butterfly suitcase.  

Relief.

Palpable.

We carried on to the bridge to our plane.  We'd been so worried about missing the flight? But there was a giant line-up of people waiting to board.

I've never been happier to be in a line-up. 

I've never been happier to walk to the back of a plane and strap myself in to another uncomfortable seat.

We were off to Foz do Iguazu.  Iguassu Falls.  Another hostel, called Favela Chic.

That hostel restored? Created? my belief in hostels.

All in good time.

Honey Island

So Ilha do Mel? Honey Island.  One of the most laid-back, beautiful, pristine places I've ever had the privilege to visit.  It has rugged bits, it has clean open beaches.  It was incredible.

Ilha do Mel does not have roads or street lights.  It was the low season, so not crawling with people, but that meant there weren't a lot of people around for us to ask for help. We also arrived after sunset - that lack of street lights was a problem.  I think Airell had a reservation at the same pousada that the SK people were staying in - the hard part was finding it.  A modest number of people live on the island, and it seemed like every house/shack/lean-to was a guesthouse.  We wandered the un-lit, tree-lined sandy paths trying to find the place without a lot of luck.  When we asked for directions, we were invariably given the hard sell for the establishment we were standing in front of.

Some of them looked quite nice, actually.    

Eventually I think we found the owner or a friend of the owner of the place Airell had reservations. We got there, and I must admit, it was a snazzy looking joint.  Expensive though, more than $100 CAD per night.   

The room for that price? Not worth $100 CAD.  Especially when our new friend from Czech was going to stay at a hostel (on the beach, no less) for $35R.  

So we cancelled the snazzy place, never did see the SK people and they left the island the next day, bound for Rio.  (Just saw them in San Diego a couple weeks ago.  They loved Rio almost as much as I did. Can't blame 'em, really).

Now I will be brutally honest.  I have stayed in hostels before.  Once in Fernie, BC more than 15 years ago, and one in Banff within a year or so of that.  They were nasty. Dirty, full of dodgy ski bums and not very friendly.  I'd always wondered why in the name of heaven people would want to stay in places like that, who cares how much money you could save. 

Well.  When you've decided to take an extra couple weeks vacation, the price of things becomes more important.  Also.  When you've decided to tag along with someone else, I operate under 'do no harm,'  'do not be a pain in the ass,' and 'what happens in Rio stays in Rio' principles.  So if Airell wanted to stay in hostels to save money, well, hells bells, I guess I was staying in a hostel as a grown-ass-37-year-old-woman-that-can-afford-a-hotel, despite those horrible experiences.  

Ha!  He told me later that he didn't think I'd actually agree to it.  Heh. I likes my comforts, yes I do - but I am also willing to try just about anything once.  I could relate a story right now but I think I want to save that for when we make it to Rio in this collection of recollections (hee!).

The guy from the fancy place walked us back to the hostel, to be sure we found it.  How nice was that?

So did I mention that the hostel was less than $20 CAD per night?  Right on the beach?  The fancy place was in a rat maze of little paths quite a distance from the beach.  The hostel was next door to a giant restaurant/bar and a cute little grocery (mercado).  You may be able to make out the Mercado sign below, the hostel is to the right.

The fancy place guy found the hostel owner/operator who took our money for the next couple of nights and set us up in the dorm.

So the thing people kept telling me about hostels?  You meet people! That also want to meet people! It's fun! Exciting! Etc!

We were the only guests at that hostel.  So we were the people! It was the low season.  But! It was clean.  The bed was reasonably comfortable.  There was a lower bunk for each of us.  The bathroom was right in the room.  You didn't get shocked (much) by the shower.  All that for less than $20? Was new fan of hostels even without all the fun and friendly people I'd been promised. 

We settled in (I think we might have gone to buy provisions for breakfast the next morning, or maybe we did that in the morning) and went in search of supper.  Naturally, since we could pretty much jump from the deck of the hostel to the deck of the bar next door, we went there for supper.  

I suspect we ate seafood. Fried cassava. Rice. Beans.  Or some variation thereof.  We ordered a lot of beer in the giant cozies.  And yet again, we made friends with people at a table near us.  It was two young guys, escaping their jobs in Brasilia? I think? There was talk about how it was a designed city with a weird shape. An airplane shape maybe?  Anyway, our English accented portuguese we used with the waiter attracted the attention of the guys, one of whom did spent an exchange year in high school with a family in Vancouver.

It was an entertaining and long evening.  Way too much to drink that night, but that was the refrain of the trip.  I was still rather down, for lack of a beter word, when we went for dinner but the combination of good company, good food and yes, good booze let me forget for a while.  Good long term coping strategy? NO.  Not even a good short-term strategy.  It wasn't even a crisis of faith as I never lost faith.  It was just a spiral I couldn't seem to climb out of in that moment. 

Anyway. Lovely evening and we got to learn lots about Brazil from our new friends.  One of us commented at one point that Brazilian music just seemed so upbeat and cheerful, and we wondered what it meant.  He translated the song playing at that moment and if he was for real, DAMN.  It might get airplay in some parts of North America, but it sure wouldn't have the same sound.  I won't even repeat it here, since it was kinda gross.

It is entirely possible he was messing with us. In which, that's hilarious, still gross and also pretty much sums up the average Brazilian male.  Heh.

The next morning we set out to explore the island after a leisurely breakfast prepared by our own hands - lots of fruit, bread and cheese.  If you've clicked the link at the top of this entry (heck, here it is again) you can see the villages and highlights of the island.  We stayed in Encantadas.  All those places are within walking distance - long distance, but you could get anywhere within a couple hours, tops.  Not far away are the Encantadas Grutas, or cave.  It is filled with ocean at high tide, when we visited it was low tide.  Lovely spot, even though it was overcast when we were there.  A busy place even during low season:

While we were at the caves I got to chatting with a solo traveler - she was a student from Germany, on leave from her Brazilian university (in Sao Paolo, maybe?) since the universities were on strike. I do not recall the reasons for this but it was big news at the time.  I do remember she had a fancy area of speciality, and that she had been a nurse back home in Germany.  I want to say it was nuclear physics (if I am off on that, it is not far off.  Very science-y).  

Turns out I took a picture of our little group:

We set off for Praia Grande, or the most pristine, deserted and huge beach I think I've ever seen:

We walked across that beach to those hills in the distance behind me (a mile or so away?) and then climbed those hills. I was 4 weeks out from surgery at this point. I? Was proud of myself.

Same beach , from those teeny hills on the far side of the last picture.  I recall looking up at the hill I took this picture from and thinking - damn, I cannot climb that. I just walked miles to get to this point.  

Then I saw a shrine thingie at the top and thought, hmm. I need to go up there, if only to take a picture of this clown:

Yep. He and Julie spent ages drawing those words in the sand only to realize they got the year wrong on the bottom. (I only laughed a little).

Ok. I laughed a lot.  (am jerk).

After I got that picture I carried on to the top of the hill.  There aren't words to describe how I felt up there.  That little hill I mentioned about was really rather tall when you're climbing it and still recovering.  Then to get up there and see water, sand, hills, rocks, basically incredible raw beauty in every direction - well, damn.  I think I tweeted this picture of myself from the top of that hill with simply the words 'Living in a moment I would die for.'

How privileged am I, really?  I've been to amazing places all over the world, I've seen beauty in all shapes and forms. Something about that place just got to me, got into the very bottom bits of my soul.  A perfect moment.  Perhaps the most perfect moment of the entire trip.  Pure contentment.  I felt closer to heaven and to God than I've ever been.  I was exactly where I needed to be when I needed to be there.   

Truthfully, if the cancer had not been contained - that mountaintop experience? Would have been enough.  I've lived, thanks.  

So that? Was a good day.  And there was more yet to come.  On this trip, and for me in general.

Once again, I applaud anyone that made it this far - I'm having fun even if no one else is.  Next time - perhaps I'll blather on enough to get us off the island to catch a plane to Foz do Iguazu (Amazing Race style).  Will they catch the slowest bus in the history of buses? Will Brenda be able to find her damn suitcase at the bus station? Will they or won't they make it to the airport in time? Tune in next time.

A van, a plane, a bus, a train, another bus, yet another bus, a boat and a freaking bike

We got to the Campo Grande airport around noon, the van part of the journey over.  We were headed to Ilha do Mel, another place I would never have chosen to visit if I weren't following someone else's tour of Brazil.  I thought Val's journey was insane (and I'd booked it! - she had to go by van to Campo Grande, fly to Sao Paolo, fly to Miami, fly to Toronto, fly to Edmonton and be met by my dad with her van so she could drive herself home).  Our journey to Ilha do Mel didn't take quite as long (36 hours) but it was weird. See the title.

Once we got to the airport we needed to pay for our flight that day and later on in the week to Iguassu Falls.  None of the Gol employees spoke english and our phrasebooks weren't terribly helpful with whatever problem was with paying for the flights.  A savior appeared in the form of an employee from another airline that sorted everything out.  For some reason both of our flights had to go on my credit card - even the guy who spoke English couldn't explain the reason -we had separate reservations, after all, but at the end of the day, it was just easier.  Weird, but easier.

That done, we figured we'd check in our bags and then find a taxi to some of the places the Canadian had told us about the night before.  Except Gol would not accept our bags for check-in until 2 hours before our flight (which I think might have been around 5pm? This was shortly after 12!)  We weren't going to drag my blue butterfly suitcase and Airell's giant backpack around Campo Grande so we asked about storage lockers.  

Apparently there were some lockers, but either they were closed or the language barrier got in the way again, but we ended up staying in the airport until time for our flight.  It's a small airport - larger than the one in Lethbridge but smaller than the one in Hamilton. On the bright side, they sold beer at the viewing area on the second floor, the chairs were deadly uncomfortable but it was better than the rows of seats on the main floor.  It was an interesting afternoon.  Lots of people came up to the viewing area to watch their loved one arrive or leave - it's a lot more meaningful there since you walk across the tarmac to your plane (wherever you want, under wings, etc, all the places you are roped off from when you walk across the tarmac in Canada/USA).  They'd wave and they'd wait until the plane left.  There would be this sometimes silent, sometimes not so silent competition between family members to find their person and point them out to the rest of the group.  I thought it was pretty entertaining - but people watching is one of my favorite activities.   I remember the weirdest stuff about that afternoon - Airell was amazed by how long the runway was and went to great lengths to explain to me why exactly it had to be so long.  (This has something to do with heat and air and lift and other things I expect I shall learn about when I sign up for flight school myself).

What can I say? It was a long afternoon and I was looking for anything to remain occupied - there weren't any places to plug in my kindle and I almost out of battery power.  I had one book with me - but I reserved it for take-offs and landings and since I had a lot of those to go - I didn't want to waste it.  I was so sick of watching the movie they played on Tam before takeoff.  

Anyway, eventually it was time to drop our bags and even more eventually, it was time to get on the plane.  We'd played my favorite trick and booked seats at the back of the plane, one on the aisle and one on the window.  If you want a better chance of getting a row to yourselves, this is the way to go - as long as you're at the back of the plane.  Worked like a charm.

 I don't recall if we had to fly to Brasilia and connect to Curitiba or if there was a direct flight. The flight details aren't in my email and it really doesn't matter anyway.  By the time we got to Curitiba it was late, dark and we had to find our way to the hotel near the train station, at which Airell had made a reservation. In the SK itinerary they'd used some kind of shuttle/bus service that was pretty cheap ($10R?) to get there so we wandered around the airport until we found the desk.

At the desk we got giggles in response to any question in English - so out came the phrase book. Somehow we managed to get a ticket on the bus, find the bus and then find out what stop we needed to get off at.

Then came the hard part.  The train station and the hotel weren't really in a snazzy part of town, if you know what I mean.  I think we had the name and address of the hotel, we could see the train station, but we didn't have any idea which way we needed to go to find the hotel.  It was like the worst geocache ever - we were tired, hungry and we couldn't eat or sleep until we found the damn place.

Finally one of us spotted it and figured out how exactly to approach the place (this section of town was weird, with fences in the median and no crossings anywhere near the hotel or where we were).  We had to walk a block or so down the street, towards an overpass under which several people were sleeping under cardboard boxes.

Airell claimed not to have noticed the homeless people.  Amazing.  We were less than 20 feet away from them, and the underpass was lighted.  It's not like the hotel would move if he took his eyes off it.  

A view from our room the next morning:

As hotels go in Brazil, this one was actually pretty nice.  The front desk guy spoke really good English (though Airell still tried portuguese, much to their amusement) and shortly we'd checked in, found our room and decided to go find something to eat.  

Did I mention this part of town was sketchy? Because it was.  There was no restaurant in the hotel and the front desk did not recommend walking anywhere to get something to eat - but they did have an assortment of menus from places that delivered.  We picked out what we wanted, and then, most importantly, the front desk guy (wish I remembered his name) called the restaurant and placed our order.  I can't imagine what we would have gotten if he hadn't helped us with that.  

We went back upstairs to wait for our dinner to arrive and found out that netflix in Brazil had How I Met Your Mother.  Eventually you just want to watch some tv, you know?  At the time you couldn't get it in Canada - which was annoying since I'd gotten hooked on the show while traveling in the US the year before. I had to buy the DVDs to get caught up on the series.  

And now it is available on Canadian Netflix.

Finally the pizza arrived:

That, my friends, is a pizza that is half ham, egg, olives and onion and the other half is banana and cinnamon.

It was strangely excellent - I think mostly because it was so weird. Also we? Were starving.  

The hotel offered breakfast so the next morning we ate quickly, checked out and walked across the street to find the train station.  We needed to get tickets on the Serra Verde Express Mountain Range Train - this would get us to a town called Morretes, where we could catch a bus? a taxi? who the hell knew? transport to the boat that would take us to Ilha do Mel.

Now again - this is not a place I think I would have found on my own.  Then again? Maybe I would have.  I never really got into making a plan of where to go and what to see, like I said before, because I wasn't sure whether I'd be going.  Then it was easier to just follow someone else's itinerary and eventually it was easiest to just let Airell do all the planning.  Which was weird. I always do the planning when I travel - and sometimes it isn't much other than - well, I'll fly here, rent a car there and see where I end up.  Still, I usually make the decsions. Or at the least, I have a lot of influence on the decision.  If you know what I mean.

So this trip was pretty weird for me.  I could get used to just following someone else around - especially when I'm basically crazy.  Airell should get a medal for successfully a) not deserting me without a phrasebook and b) letting me tag along on an awesome adventure.  

So.  We had to get on the train.  The higher class trains with english guides were sold out, so we got a portuguese version.  At the last minute, Airell suggested that since Ilha do Mel did not have roads, it might be a good idea to leave my luggage in a locker.

This was a good idea, but I had about 15 minutes to make it happen.  And I had no carryon, only the canvas bag we'd been given at the conference a couple weeks before.  It wasn't very big - and I would be without my luggage for a couple of days.

I found a cloth bag thing at the gift shop in the train station and asked someone where I could find a locker.  At the bus station - which was just next door.

Alrighty.  I ran over to the station, found a locker and then had to complete a very complicated process of buying a token for the locker.  At some point a complete stranger came up to me and started giving me advice.  Cannot tell a lie - my alarm bells were going off - was he helping me to figure out what I had worth stealing? Was he hitting on me? Just a friendly guy seeing a lady in distress?  All of the above were possibly true.  But I also had a train to catch and I needed the help.  He helped me get a token from a newsagent shop across the hall from the locker, helped me insert the token and then he went on his way.  I packed my 2 pathetic bags with all due haste - including almost everything one would need for a couple of days away from your luggage.  I left my laptop behind in my suitcase because I did not have room for it.  

I don't know how anyone else packs under pressure, but damn, I did ok.  I forgot some stuff, but I had the important bits like my wallet, a swimsuit, sunscreen, a scarf, my meds (a bag all on its own) a jacket and assorted bits of clothing.  

All stuff into the equivalent of a reusable shopping bag you'd get at Safeway.  

I've never felt like more of a hobo.  You know, if I'd planned to stay in Brazil longer (and before I found out I was sick I was planning to extend my stay - but then I was busy being sick and it seemed a good idea to stick to 2 weeks) I'd have used a different suitcase.  Maybe I'd even have gone out and bought a proper backpack.  As it was, I used a lightweight suitcase owned by my niece and it worked for me.  That suitcase made some miles and I had to get it repaired when I returned to Canada, before I returned it to Anna.

So when it came time to board the train I was... frazzled.  The trip on the train was amazing - so glad someone in SK learned about the Island and the awesome journey to get there. A selection of pictures:

Aren't these trees cool looking?

I have dozens of this view of the train.  It was only the second time I've ridden on a train that wasn't in an amusement park!

Every now and again we'd pass derelict buildings on the side of the tracks. It was something to take a picture of, so I did. 

The views from the train were awesome.

See?

See?  What is embarassing is that I was so tired during the train ride that I had to fight to stay awake.  I chalked it up to moving non-stop (despite hours in hammocks) and the crazy rappel into the cave.  What I realize now is that I was starting to suffer from an undersupply of thyroid hormone.  It should have been obvious.  Instead I was simply bewildered by my sudden ability to fall asleep anywhere at almost anytime.

That is not me.

We got off the train in a town called Morretes.  There were a few options to get to the port in Paranaguá where we could find a boat to take us to Ilha do Mel.  Taxi or a bus.  The taxi? $100R. The bus? $4R.  (About $2 CAD)

We took the bus.  Airell befriended Julie, a backpacker from the Czech Republic, in the train station in Morretes while I set off in the direction of the bus station - she was headed the same place we were so we ended up traveling to the island together.  We had to wait for a bus to the city of Paranaguá, so I took the time to buy something to eat at the shop in the station.  I couldn't identify anything I saw, and they all looked to be pastries full of some kind of meat.

It was tasty. And more importantly, filling. 

The first bus took us to the station in Paranaguá.  Julie spoke a bit of portuguese - she'd spent her summer teaching in a school somewhere in Brazil (I forget quite where) so with her help we found the right bus to take us to the port.  I remember the second bus station taking a very long time, and I was really tired.  I started thinking about life, the universe and everything, and more importantly, my place in life, the universe and everything, and despite my best intentions - my head got into a really weird space.

I hate to keep bringing this up - when I left Canada I had permission from the doctor to travel, but I did not have the results of the pathology.  I confess that part of the reason I wanted to stay in Brazil was that I couldn't get the results until September, when the doc would be back from his vacation.  I had worrisome test results and I'd read oncology papers that scared the crap out of me - based on my test results.

90% of the time I was ok. I was supported by prayers of people around north America.  The other 10%? (Or insert arbitrary number here) - I was not ok.  And it didn't matter how many times you told me not to worry, that I would be ok, I was still plagued by that test result and the reading I'd done.

I challenge anyone to live through that and remain positive and upbeat ALL. THE. TIME. They could teach lessons, because I couldn't do it. I tried.

Anyway.  This was one of those time where I got into my head and got into a downward spiral that was going to take some work and prayer to crawl out of.

Good thing Airell had company.  For I? Was not good company.

When we got to the port we had a bit of fun finding the ticket office, then more fun buying the tickets and then we just missed a boat leaving for the island.

So then we sat and waited on the next boat for about an hour.

More time to get inside my own head.  I looked at this view for all that time:

The boat eventually filled up, and the departure time approached and voila, we were underway.  I finally got to capture the upside down moon that I kept describing to people when I'd been in Australia:

Good thing I captured that bit of roof to prove that the moon is backwards below the equator.  I never did see the Southern Cross. 

If memory serves, the boat ride to the island was about half an hour.  A half an hour in which the sun was setting:

It was sublime:

And finally, after 36 hours (not adjusting for time zones), we had reached our next destination.

And what a destination it was.  

malaria pills and random strangers

So there's been this thing I've been forgetting to mention - malaria pills.  I'd gotten the suspicious biopsy result but I don't think I'd met my surgeon quite yet, or hell, maybe I had and he'd told me I would be able to go to Brazil, anyway, Val and I went to a travel immunization clinic.  

The visit basically consisted of a nurse looking at a map of Brazil, noting all of the things that could kill you or make your life unpleasant and then selling us another shot/pill.  I was up to date with most regular immunizations - I step on a nail every 9 years and so my tetanus is good, and has been for at least 26 years (due to step on another nail in the next year).  

I don't recall what all we got - yellow fever for sure, dukoral for travelers diarrhea (tasted like crap) that also immunized for cholera.  Val needed the hepatitis shots - I got mine a decade ago when I first went to the Dominican Republic. 

Our tentative travel plan included a trip up to the amazon - a prime malaria spot.  So, the nurse wrote Val a prescription for malaria tablets and I was told to have my doctor write me a prescription (the nurse had to charge for writing the script).  I had the doctor's office on speed dial at the time so a simple call to the nurse to ask if I needed to come in for the script had them calling the script in to my pharmacy.  Convenient.  In the meantime we decided to go to the Pantanal instead, which wasn't part of the prime malaria area BUT we figured, ehh, we got the pills so we might as well take them.  Your start them when you get to the malaria area, continue while you are there and then for a specified time afterward. 

Heavens.  That was way too much information to get to the main point, the thing they don't tell you about anti-malarials.  

Vivid. Crazy. Ass. Dreams.  I don't remember most of mine - but I recall waking from time to time while on them and thinking 'what in the name of eff was that about?'  Seriously. WEIRD CRAZY DREAMS.  All caps isn't enough for the weirdness of them.  Ask anyone that's been on anti-malarials - IS CRAZY ASS CRAZY.  With a side of WTF and REALLY and HUH, I WAS NOT AWARE THAT WAS PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE?

The one I remember, naturally, was not that exciting and I am going to be super-dull and share it with you now and you will think, 'yeah, crazy ass dream right there' while smiling and nodding.  It was about returning to Rio, I became obsessed with getting the perfect tattoo and I dragged Airell over the entire city to find the perfect shop to get that tattoo.  

I wish I could remember the others. Or what and where the tattoo would be/go. The dreams were weird but high on the awesome scale.

***

So, when last we met at a screen near you, I was going on about floating down rivers and rapelling into caves to scuba dive in a lake.  Note: My sister was not impressed with me diving so soon after surgery. What can I say - I was on the batshit side of insane.  

I was, in a word, exhausted by the Abismo Anhumas excursion.  It was time for some food - we'd had granola bars while in the cave but it had been a long time since breakfast.  

Of all places, I ended up going back to the rat restaurant. We did not order rat.  We did get the caiman bites again, a copious amount of beer and heavens, probably some other food.  When we got back to the Muito Bonito, we had to move to a new hotel.  We were originally intending to leave Bonito that morning, and while Pamela, concierge extraordinaire thought she had room - in fact, she did not.  

She did find us a room at a hotel just down the street for the same price.  The directions were vague - oh, down the street and over there with a general wave of her hand.  (This type of help might not seem up to north American standards but she was so friendly and happy you didn't care. Also, on vacation so whatever).

The new hotel? Did not have wifi.  We were allowed to spend time at the Muito Bonito and have breakfast there. Perfect. I think I spent the rest of the afternoon comfortably ensconced in one of those hammocks, reading a book, napping and watching the clouds and people go by.  Since we'd changed our departure date from Bonito, we'd had to book flights to our next destination.  This was both harder and easier than you'd think. The Brazil airline most analagous to Air Canada is Tam. Tam offers an airpass that allows you to hop around the country way cheaper than buying flights individually.  The catch? You have to book your flights ahead of time and you can't change the destinations.  I hated this - I like to leave my options open.  

Anyway.  We had to get ourselves to Curitiba for the next part of the trip.  Busses were an option (16h?) but the timing didn't work out for some reason. THANK HEAVEN.

Well, turns out, Brazil has more than one airline (IMAGINE THAT).  Gol became our airline of choice for the rest of the trip - cheap fares and good service.  The one thing that was annoying? Their website did not accept international credit cards.  But!  You could make a reservation and pay at the airport.

So we'd done that maybe the day before, or maybe while at the Santa Clara.  We had to book more flights at some point and so I logged into my Gol account (yes, I have one of those) and damned if that pay-at-the-airport-reservation was cancelled.  Apparently the fine print says that you have to pay within a certain time and our time? Was up.  

But! If you got on a livechat with an agent, they would take your reservation code (once you rebooked the same damn seat you'd already booked) and put a hold on it for long enough for you to pay at the airport.  You know, when you weren't 5 hours away with only a Canadian credit card as a payment option.

I dunno, but I thought that kind of service was awesome.  I miss being able to make a reservation and paying for it later.  

Eventually it was time to eat again - we'd met some people in the cave that suggested where to go, there was supposed to be live music so we wandered in the general direction of the place we thought the live music was.

We never did find the live music - but we did find a quaint little place on a corner with tables outside and a decent vibe.  The waiter did not speak much, if any, English and this attracted the attention of a group at a nearby table.

Turns out there was another Canadian at the next table.  A PhD student in town on a break while doing some field research.  Her study was on the Japanese immigrant experience in Brazil.  There was a reason this was/is important but I could not possibly tell you what it was/is.  Anyway, she was doing her work in Campo Grande (where we were headed to catch a flight with a massive layover after a van ride from Bonito).  They were full of suggestions of what to do, and where to go.  We would be there on a Monday so the market wouldn't be open, but apparently the Japanese noodle restaurants/stalls were not to be missed.  

Anyway, this nice Canadian (from Montreal, maybe?) offered to help us order, and we ended up just joining their group.  It was one of the most entertaining evening I've ever had with complete strangers - half of whom didn't speak the same language as me.  We ordered way too much food, all of which was delicious, had way too much to drink (is the refrain of this entire trip) and eventually parted ways with our new acquaintances and stumbled back to the hotel.  

We had an early van to catch.  A 4-5 hour van ride later, after a short stop at this lovely place for a bathroom break:

Hee! I'd forgotten the van was a Vanzella.  Pretty comfortable, too.  

Quite a ways out from Campo Grande, one began to see this:

For miles, on either side of the highway, tiny shacks made out of whatever was available - tarps, bits of old wood, cardboard.  I remember seeing some with cars parked near them.  In Rio there are favelas (slums) right next to the high class ritzy areas.  The divide between rich and poor is wide, high and long.  It's caused unrest in the country in the past couple of months.  

What was especially odd was that some of the tarp shacks on the side of  the highway had  cars parked near them.  Residents? Visitors? Workers? I do not know.  

That car looks like it belongs in that spot, no?

And I ramble around in 4000 square feet. By myself. Plus heated comfort for my car.

I felt uncomfortable as we were driving by these shacks on the side of the road, and I feel the same way now. 

I don't know what to do with that.