South America 2007

Had a bit of a reunion in Rio and met up with the original group I was travelling with in Peru which was really nice, including Previn (Sorry didnt have a chance to catch up with you and say goodbye before I left Previn, hope your project goes well dude) Headed to Foz do Iguacu with Chris, Alex, Louise and Gill. We spent two nights on the Brazilian side of the falls in an amazing hostel that had a swimming pool and spent a couple of days walking around the falls, was lush. Even tried out our hitch-hiking skills as couldn´t be arsed to wait for the bus and managed to get a lift both times.

Foz do Iguacu was beautiful, 275 different waterfalls that crash 80M into the Rio Iguacu, incredible. The pictures speak for themselves...

Chris and I decided to parasend of a wall, which was the best buzz ever. The guys thought I was nuts when I started getting all hyper and spitting out a thousand words a second when I relized I was going down the mountain rather than across, brilliant adrenaline rush!

After 2 nights on the Brazilian side we crossed the border over to Argentina to take a closer look at the falls as the Brazilian side offers more of a grand overview. Whilst looking lost and waiting for a bus a deaf guy started helping Chris and I by typing questions into his mobile phone, how helpful is that?! Chris and I then met an argentinian couple to share a taxi with and again they gave me all their contact details for when I arrive in Buenos Aires, latinos are so unbelievably friendly!

The Argentinian side of the falls was equally as impressive and we took a couple of boat rides under the falls...

So I finally convinced the others to come into Paraguay with alot of persuasion techniques to get off the Gringo trail. Statistics show that roughly only 250 Brits a year go to Paraguay compared to about 160,000 that go to Brazil. There´s not even a British embasy there, well apparantly there´s nothing there, but we´re just about to find out, let the adventure begin...

Opted to get a flight from salvador to Rio as opposed to the 30 hour bus ride and it worked out cheaper, whats that all about?

Flight was at stupid o clock in the morning so had a kip on the airport floor. When I opened my eyes there were loads of people spectating the barefoot napping traveller sucking her thumb. One guy thought I was a tramp and offered me some money, ha ha! Thinking about it I should have taken it!, dam I missed that one! (I must sort my grimey traveller image out before I get to your wedding Gems!)

Rio has a population of just over 7 million and its huge! The locals are really welcoming to tourists and love to party. First day in Rio went to see Christ the Redemer (cristo redentor), amazing views from the mountain overlooking the city and sugar loaf (pao de acucar) in the background. Went with some other travellers from the hostel and we timed it just right for sunset.

I Decided to take a tour into Rochina Favela, South Americas largest slum/shanty town. About a third of Rios poulation live in the favelas and as it is the centre of crime and corruption not advisable to rock up there alone. The top guy who runs the Rochina favela is protected by the 10 golden guys who each own golden guns, but are all anonymous as is the main guy - who reaps in no less than 4 million dollars a month through drugs and arms and get this - is only 24 years old! I shit you not Rio is just about as corupt as it gets. As with Salvador hearing loads of travellers stories about being mugged and constantly being warned by locals to take care, thankfully the only thing i´m suffering with is a hangover!

One of my highlights in Rio has to be going to see the final of Flamengo and Madeira at the Maracana stadium. Probably the best night out i´ve ever had. We got a groupy together at the hostel, 22 of us in total and joined the crowds. The atmosphere was unreal, the fans were going absolutely mental and I mean MENTAL! The score was 4-1 to Flamengo which was who the majority were supporting, so luckily the Brazilians were loving it and going absolutely crazy, brilliant night.

So Rio de Janeiro! Massive city but a city with a difference - theres a beach and not just any beaches - Copacabana and Ipanema, nice one! Stayed in a hostel on copacabana beach and had a blast. My time in Rio is still a bit of a blur, but from what I can remember from the odd occasional flashback it was great! Became abit nocturnal, beach bum by day and party animal by night.

Last night in Rio went out in a club smack bang in the middle of a favela. Shit man, you don´t wanna be hanging round one of these places on your own, scarey stuff. The dance floor was full of proper gangsters all with their shirts off and the women were just as scarey covered in tatoos. Felt like I was in some kind of gangster movie - brilliant night though and again met some great people who looked after me (those of you who know me well know is necessary after a few beers - well ok after one actually!)

So goodbye Rio, good times had but need to get out of Brazil its too expensive. Next stop is Iguacu...

My stay in Salvador was great, totally fell in love with the place and found it really hard to move on. Salvador is Brazils third largest city and has a strong African influence. Cobbled streets, afro-carribbean culture, live bands and music playing in the streets, artists, musicians, dancers, reggae bars, this place for me was so surreal. Bob Marley, bring it on!

Salvador has a reputation for thefts and muggings, seems every other traveller I have spoken to has had some nasty experience of being mugged at knife point, got involved with some kind of corrupt police scam or pickpocketed, its not hard to see why, Salvador is full of dodgy little side streets and full of corruption due to the poverty. Thankfully I haven´t had any problems yet and I have personally found quite the opposite. The locals are really really friendly, curious and helpful and they keep throwing their phone numbers and email addresss at me left right and centre for if I encounter any problems. Definately makes a difference being able to speak the lingo, even getting the hang of a bit of portugese as its fairly similar to spanish.

After carnival everything was pretty chilled, moved out of Barra which is on the Beach into Pelourhino, the cultural centre and spent most days exploring the city, museums, churches, the famous lighthouse, going to the theartre and visted a couple of capoeira schools - the traditional brazilian cross between a martial art and dance. Also went to watch condomble - an ancient ritual of spirit possession and voodoo.

Had a great time and again have met loads of amazing people, mixture of locals and other travellers, also starting to bump into travellers that i´ve met previously in other cities. I really have fallen in love with Salvador and the nearby island of Itaparica, only 20 minutes away by boat - white sands and clear waters...paradise. Even went horse riding along the beach.

First time I discovered the island was with a group of Brazilians from sao paulo and a brilliant guy from Uraguay called Mauizcio, who I got on really well with and who speaks like Borat (Hi Mauizico - I´ll be in motevideo after Paraguay - so see you soon and don´t forget the skydive!!!)

Also had quite an emotional couple of weeks, since arrival in Latin America haven´t really seen much poverty as I expected. Salvador however was full of beggers, mainly malnutritioned children. One night Mauizico and I met this kid on the street who was 13 years old but looked about 7, where he basically doesnt eat and his body hasn´t grown properly, it´s so sad.

Next stop is Rio de Janeiro.......

So made it to Salvador with no accomodation booked at 4.30 in the morning, hmmm. But it was fine, found a hostel, a litte pricey but to be expected for last night of carnival and was happy not to have to sleep in the airport as had already missed 2 nights of sleep.

Met some grand Irish girls, (hi girlies - hope you made it to recife ok!) and some other randoms to enjoy carnival with. I was a bit aprehensive about personal saftey and muggers during carnival - but felt mega safe - the only problem really was the letchy men who try and grind up against you every opportunity and its hard to peel them off. Unfortunately have no pics of carnival as didnt want to risk getting mugged for my camera. Crime rate for carnival 2007 doubled from last year and there were even 2 shootings on the last night of carnival, the brazilians are mental.

The Tshirts required to enter the Blocos were really expensive so didnt buy one, thankfully, as still managed to get under the ropes, soon as the security saw us they would throw us out and we would creep back in again after 5 mins or so. The bloco we followed was Fat Boy Slim, how funny - the only foreign bloco in Salavdor and it was ramed.

Glad I managed to make carnival, was cool night, streets were jam packed with people partying to the max, the atmosphere was electric. Had some bizare moments on the beach. When nature calls, nature calls and where the girls pee - so do the tranvestites, need I say more? gross!

The women here also fight like men and the police treat them like men - sacrey stuff, you dont want to be waking up in a brazilian cell, although thats where I thought I was when I woke up this morning in my hostel. It was empty - I actually had a 10 bed dorm to myself - does everyone know something that I dont???

OK so the crying episode is over and the bites are gone...

Wow wow wow, the trip across the amazon was amazing, views were great and 5 days on deck in my hammock were rather chilled.

Just to perfect the journey, met some wicked people, and got a chance to get to know some ultra friendly brazilians. Also met some other gringos and had a blast. (Hi Nathan! - wicked time, thanks for teaching me to play Travis on the guitar and the hilarious entertainment you provided whilst making out with the columbian man eater!)

Also met some other great people to party with and to help me find my way back in the dark to my hammock - almost impossible when everyone is asleep and even more difficult to not fall out when pissed! The guys in the boat shop were also great fun and I worked out how to order beer and not pay for it - basically order the beer, chat for 10 mins and then walk away - simple yet effective!

On arrival to Manaus, an Irish lass that I met on the boat got sick really suddenly, had high fever and basically couldnt move. After one night of watching her suffer and die in my room I decided it was hospital time as suspicions of malaria were high. Managed to meet a brazilian woman called Gloria, possibly the kindest women i´ve ever met, she drove us to the hopital which was 45 mins away and was really helpful, definately altruism at it´s best. She even gave me her address in Rio de janeiro as thats where she was heading for carnival and said were more than welcome to crash there if we head that direction...and guess what? Its right on copacabana beach...nice one! Back to the irish girl, she was fine after a couple of days.

After a brief stay in Manuas, decided to try and make carnival somewhere on the coast. First stop was Belem, Brazilian side of the amazon basin. I stayed in this amazing hotel (well amazing compared to where I have been staying), it had hot water, decent breakfast, clean sheets, its own TV and more to the point a beautiful sparkling clean toilet. So the moral of the storey is if any other fellow travellers are reading this that have diarrhoea - hotel Belem is the way forward. This is the first toilet seat I have been able to actually sit on in South America.

From Belem I got a shitty 25 hour bus journey to Fortaleza. Thought that they celebrated carnival there, but it was not as expected. Did find one street party though and had a brill time and got covered in foam. Surprise, surprise I was a tad smashed and got a bit carried away with my foam and was actually aiming for peoples eyes! What a bitch!

Met some lovely Argentinians who fortunately helped me get home because without them I wouldnt have had a clue and was looking like a bit of a spacky tourist pulling my map out in the middle of the crowd! (Thanks guys - I know you will be reading my blog as Alex passed the message on that you were trying to get in contact with me, cant believe you found his blog on the net!!! - We will def have to meet up in Argentina when I get there!)

So Fortaleza was not my cup of tea, although there was a beach it was pissing down with rain (and looked a bit like Bognor Regis) so got out quick smart and headed to Salvador, to experience the real carnaval....