Touristing

 

Despite the rain and migraines, we've had fun in Paranaguá. Yesterday we walked around the historical downtown to see the sites and visit the sad little aquarium. Afterwards we crossed the bridge to a decidedly not touristy area for a different kind of site seeing and then called it a day. Today we went out between storms to paddle a kayak around in the mangroves and treat ourselves to gelato. There is a certain charm to hanging out in a lesser known area, it's a different side of Brazil than what we are used to, plus nobody speaks to us in English and the prices are great. We are leaving for Ilha do Mel tomorrow but we are happy to have visited the little old port city of Paranaguá. 

Paranaguá

We drove east to a very old and mostly faded port city in Paraná named Paranaguá. It's a super industrial area where we've literally seen 100s if not 1000s of auto shops. Needless to say, it was a good place to be having car troubles. We found an automatic transmission place and got a liter of transmission fluid and the go-ahead from a nice mechanic who talked fast af. The two meals we have had so far have been pretty good and the vibe is working class pleasant. I failed a language test at the drug store but Carol had a positive language interaction with a masseuse (which she is going to write about em o novo blog dela) so on average our Portuguese learning is fine.  

Leaving Curitiba (for now)

 

We came to Curitiba for the train, and it was okay. Truth is, the Durango to Silverton narrow gauge railroad has ruined us for other railroads. The bus ride to Morretes was really cool though, through bromeliads and blooming banana trees, down a narrow cobblestone road for 1000s of feet. We'd recommend the bus ride -- but Morretes itself was really hot and could have used a few bars. The city of Curitiba, we haven't had enough of. We spent today at the botanical gardens, which were lovely (and free) and then we went to the Oscar Niemeyer museum. Our friends Ron and Andre told us to temper our expectations - but we didn't- and it was still better than we expected. Caipirinhas and fries afterwards at the Sunset bar where we obliged and stayed for sunset and then a 9 minutes uber home past murals and sculptures and city life. We are headed to the coast tomorrow, but we will be back to Curitiba in about a week to get a little bit more.

Curitiba here we come

 

We left the peaceful mountain cabin and drove 8 hours north to Curitiba, capital of the state of Parana. The trip went well except for noticing that the transmission is really starting to go. It's plush to be in a big city, we walked out of our 32 story apartment building looking for dinner, past a Korean restaurant, 2 bars, and a market and within 5 minutes found a peruvian place with fantastic ceviche and speciality cocktails. Our main goal here is to ride on the narrow gage railroad that runs through the mountains between Curitiba and the sea. We will do that tomorrow. Then we will try to enjoy the botanical gardens and get our laundry done and head south to enjoy some beach life again before we really head inland. Road life continues to be be good.

Adios to Morro Azul

 

After just four nights, the time has come to leave our little mountain retreat above Uribici. This has been a great way to start our trip, but we might have set the bar high as far as enjoyability. In addition to doing a little (too much) work, we also laid around reading in the hammocks, enjoyed our mornings from a deck overlooking the valley and caught a sunset from a parklike space with a glorious view. We found ourselves reverting to some of our old mountain ways up here in the mountains, like turning a 12 mile hike into almost 17 miles and winding up completely alone in an amazing place.  This amazing place happened to be a waterfall where we lazed away a cool misty afternoon in the middle of a steamy hot day. We saw a part of Brazil that we haven't seen before, with tobacco farms and rural ways. Carol became a bit of an expert on the area, playing tour guide to visitors who wandered up our road looking for things to do. I imagine we will get back this way but you never know, life is short and there is so much to do. Whether we come back or not, it was "super vale a pena" as they say around here, and we are glad that we came.

Chapter 2 - On the Road

 

We left Keppy in Utah (thanks mom and dad) and returned to Florianopolis to get our car and embark on a long road trip. We are not entirely sure of the itinerary but we are going to be traveling for 52 days, through at least five states, and then we will pick up our friends in Sao Paulo and travel some more. 

Today was day one. First we went out for a session on the body board and then we shoved all of our belongings into our hopefully trusty Ford Focus and hit the road. Our goal was the mountain town of Uribici, just about 100 miles west of Floripa. The first hour basically got us out of town, then we did an hour or two through the hilly countryside, jaws dropping at the dangerous passes made by impatient drivers, and then we took a left at a sign for Urubici. That's when things got interesting. The vegetation got lush with ferns and araucaria trees and the road got so windy that even a person who has driven her whole life in the mountains thought it was windy. We made it to town, ate lunch at an emporium with a satisfying por kilo buffet and then we put the car in first gear and gunned it up the steep dirt road to our little $24 per night cabin with a view. Although we were warned about the heat, it's been cool here so far, literally and figuratively. The air is filled with the sounds of birds and bugs and frogs and we think it is the perfect place to hole up for a few days and study the map.

Out with the old

 Before we start the new chapter, we need to close out the last one. We ended up making videos for our school. They are all in portuguese, nearly the the photos and certainly all the video are ours. The last one is the best.

How to hike to Naufragados

This history of Lagoa

Troubles in paradise

Floripa Floripa