Hello Biff fans!

So Wednesday, our boat wasn't until 3.30pm, so had a bit of a wander round Paranagua and stopped at the bar next to our hostel to wait for our boat to come. As we were eating, Miguel from the previous night wandered in! Luckily his complete lack of English stopped him engaging in conversation too much!

Our boat arrived, and was much smaller than the Ilha Grande ferry. Everyone was rammed on, bringing stuff back with them from the mainland, televisions, bags of herbs, french bread flour - allsorts! It then started to rain, so everyone squished in even more, trying to keep their televisions and themselves out of the wet! We sat near the back of the boat with a group of young Brazilians, who seemed to delight in the fact that they could talk about us openly and we couldn't understand! The boat took over two hours and because of the rain, wasn't really that enjoyable!

The boat first stopped at the village in the middle of the island, Braisilia, and some of the people, and their various stuff left the boat. We stayed at the back, and one of the men working the boat came to talk to us, completely in Portuguese, but we managed to get the gist of what he was staying and he kindly pointed out our hostel as we approached our village - Encantadas.

As we left the boat and walked down the pier, the heavens opened and we were left running down the beach in a downpour, trying to keep ourselves, and our rucksacks dry! Luckily the hostel wasn't far, but still arrived dripping wet! The hostel was lovely, and you can see that it would have been fantastic in the scorching heat of summer! One benefit to being here in the autumn/winter - we had a whole room to ourselves again, which was lucky really as needed to dry out all our stuff!

The rain slowed down, but didnt stop and as it was dark we only ventured to the supermarket next door where we bought the ingredients for a simple pasta dinner! Cooking in the kitchen was fun - Beth nearly set her hand on fire trying to light the hob and the water took forever to boil! Still was nice enough! Spent the rest of the evening drinking beer under the shelter of a big straw umbrella looking out to sea and laughing about the old school days (I Broke my arm! I couldn't write!).

Early night, and woke up to the sound of the beach! Luckily the rain had stopped and it was actually quite a clear and sunny morning. After breakfast, grabbed a map and headed off on our little island trek. First stop was the Encantadas Grotto, a big cave on the beach. We then walked up a long beach, with bizarre sinking sand which made it very tiring to walk on! After this, we had a steep climb up a hill to get to the next beach - Praia Miguel. This was much easier to walk on, but when we came to the end of it, due to the position of the tide, the only way round the headland to the next beach was a bit of a rock climb. Seriously guys, the pictures do not do the challenge justice! and as we were going round a corner, we had no way of knowing when it was going to end, or how bad it was going to get! Managed to reach Praia Grande without as much as grazed knee, let alone a cracked skull so all was fine!

At the end of this beach we crossed inland to Brasilia and round to the famous lighthouse. This invloved another steep climb and more steps! We reached the top and the lighthouse (which was shipped from Glasgow), and were able to look back along the coast, and the five miles we had walked. At this point, it started to rain slightly, and we headed back to Brasilia for some lunch. We both went for the surf special, involving a big piece of fish and fried shrimp (and yes Mum, some salad!). Was lovely! After walking through Brasilia and stopping for more bracelets at a little hippy stall, we managed to find a man with a boat to take us back to Encantadas.

The pier at Encantadas must be the pier of doom, as once again, as we stepped out it started to really pour it down! So yet again, arrived at the hostel soaking! The weather was so bad that there was no way we were going anywhere in it, so curled up with our BA blankets on some beanbags in an old boat and watched Disney's Tarzan. It was all in Portuguese but we completely understood (the plot not the language!) and was actually quite a nice lazy way to spend the rest of the afternoon.

We were still full from our big lunch, so a cup noodle did us for dinner! Again, ate it drinking Skol and looking out over the sea and listening to the rain. As we were sat there, the guy from the Paranagua boat walked past and stopped to talk to us. Again, all in Portuguese, but he still made sense, more sense than his bizarre friend who just kept banging his chest, leaning in too far and telling us to talk?! Anyway they left and we got an early night, for an earlier start in the morning!

Alarm clocks were set for 6am to get the boat back at 7.30am. We were too early for breakfast, so dumped our sheets and set off. Would you believe it, as soon as we did.... it started with the terrential downpour! By the time we reached the pier we were dripping! Our rucksacks (i.e. everything we have with us) were soaked too. The boat was not fun! Tired and damp we tried to sleep on the hard wooden benches!

Arrived at Parangua (raining) with just enough time to get to the bus station, buy a ticket and buy postcards. Had to head back to Curitiba to get the next bus. When we got there two hours later (raining) we bought our tickets to Florianopolis and sat and had some lunch (worse sandwich ever!). The bus took just over five hours (rained all the way) and for some reason we had to move to a different coach halfway through! We are getting quite used to these journeys so the trip was fine, and managed to sleep some of the way, despite being both sat next to strangers!

Arrived in Florianopolis (raining) and got a taxi to Lagoa, where our hostel is. Hostel is nice, again we have a room to ourselves (again good thing as all our stuff is drying everywhere!) and the guy (and the pug dog) on reception is very friendly.

After sorting through our rain soaked rucksacks, we nipped to the supermarket to stock up on tolietries, then headed to a little mexican restaurant (pointed out by the guy at the hostel) We nibbled on chips and salsa/guacamole and had a taco each. We both decided that we would try the tiny little chilli that came on the plate, bad idea. Tiff's chest was on fire and Beth still can't fully feel the right side of her tongue. Walked back (in the rain.)

Just been sorting stuff out tonight, we are determined for a big night out tomorrow, even if we have to go naked because our stuff hasn't dried! So please people, although we are still having a great time, don't be smug that the weather is better there than here, and pray with us that we get some sunshine tomorrow!

Miss you and love you all!

B&T x x x