We landed in Sao Paulo at 20:00 Saturday night from Peru. Not very good time planning from my travel agent, was my thoughts at the time. We did not want to spend money ( and we've learnt that it is awfully expensive getting from and to any airport) going into Sao Paulo, so we opted for the airport bus to the central bus station. The last bus leaving for Ubatuba was scheduled for 22:00, so after some struggle in Portuguese/English (we were still used to Spanish at this time) we figured out that we will miss it if we take the airport bus, but might be in time if we take a (very expensive) taxi. We took the chance with the taxi and we made it!! Hey, thats what traveling is all about, taking chances. What was not so cool is that we arrived in Ubatuba at 2am in the morning and the next bus to Paraty only leaves at 7am! It was a small, creepy bus station with only 4 plastic chairs behind a iron gate between the busses. We sat there until later we decided to take another chance and asked if we could at least climb into one of the empty busses and wait/sleep in there for the rest of the night. Once again we were lucky and the friendly Brazilian agreed!

At 7 we got onto our bus with all the locals, on our way to Paraty! What a beautiful place. Try to picture this - lush green mountains, forests, mist everywhere with islands that peaks at us at every 2nd turn in the road. It was totally worth the long night... Paraty is a small coastal town with an old historic centre of cobble stones and beautiful buildings. It was the port from where gold was shipped that came all the way with the 2000km golden path from Ouro Preto inland. The town was declared a Unesco world heritage site and is truely pretty with its oldness and hundreds of surrounding islands. We chilled here for a few days, recovering from our Amazon adventure, enjoying the beauty Brazil had to offer. We took a boat cruise to 4 of the islands (very touristy, but we could not miss out on this), kayaked between the island, sipped the national drink, caprinhas from hammocks on the beach, cycled to the waterfalls, although we confirmed once again that cycling is not for us. Every time we rented bicycles, something on one of the bikes would break and we ended up pushing the bikes uphill and freeing downhill. (sorry Mikke, maar daai mountain biking gaan nie werk vir ons nie...) Paraty was heaven! I would really recommend this as the perfect honeymoon spot (Dean, lees jy???)!! Here we also stayed in a pousada (like a family-run bed and breakfast house), owned by David from Arizona and his Brazilian wife. We had such a great time staying there, they where very helpful and I loved the pão de queiso and the yoga!!!

Na 5 dae in Paraty was ons uitgerus en reg vir 'n nuwe avontuur. Ons het besluit om 'n kar te huur, uitgefigure hoe kom mens in Visconde de Maua, 'n klein forel dorpie in die berge. En daar gaat ons alweer, die Uno, ons, geen padkaart en 'n ipad sonder 3G. Ai tog, maar weereens was dit absoluut die moeite werd! Die kronkelpad so deur die berge was asemrowend mooi en tipies ek, wou ek in die laaste deel van die dorpie bly, Maromba - 20km verder in die berge in met 'n Uno op 'n grondpad!! Gelukkig het my man 'n bietjie 4x4 ondervinding, en die beste 4x4 is mos 'n huurmotor!!!! So ons het dit gemaak tot in Maromba.

Visconde de Maua bestaan uit 3 villages - Maua, Marimba en Maromba, die laaste een so bietjie van 'n hippie plek. Ons pousada was weereens 'n droom van 'n plekkie, 'n houthuisie op die oewer van 'n rivier met 'n kaggeltjie en hangmat op die stoepie! Heaven!!! En eks opnuut weer mal oor 'n hangmat, ons gaan definitief myne permanent opsit as ons terug is by die huis... Visconde de Maua is bekend vir sy grilled trout, en lucky vir ons was die 1ste restaurantjie waar ons instap 'n meisie wat goed Engels kon praat. Sy vertel ons toe van Moses en sy trout net bietjie verder op in die straat. Die beste in die omgewing volgens haar, en ons kan 100% saamstem! By Moses aangekom, bestel ons toe 2 grilled trouts met iets, ons het nie 'n clue wat nie en Moses se Engels is so goed soos ons Portugees...! Maar dit kom toe daar aan met amandels op die een en sampioene op die ander, kompleet met rys, groente, slaai, heerlik!!! Soos ons kon aflei so deur die aand is Moses vernoem na Moses in die Bybel. Maromba was in vloed toe hy 5dae oud was, iemand het die babatjie in die rivier gekry en dit was toe huis. 'N koerant uitknipsel, de hoogs! Ons het heerlik gekuier saam die man, al kon niemand 'n woord van die ander se taal verstaan nie. Dit het gesous die aand en Moses het selfs vir ons 'n lift aangebied na ons Pousada toe wat ons baie dankbaar aanvaar het. Ons pousada was 3 km uit die village uit, ons het geen sambreel by ons gehad nie en dit was stik giet donker in die berge. Dit was ons tweede lift in 5 dae, een ding het ons geleer, die Brazilianers kan regtig nie Engels praat nie, maar hul is so gretig om te help en te probeer verstaan. Ons het hierdie mense so waardeer. Die volgende dag het ons in die 3 villages rondgeloop en nog heerlike trout en 'pão de queijo' geeet. Maandag het ons weer ons pad teruggevind Paraty toe om die Uno terug te gee en 'n bus te vang Ouro Preto toe.

Ouro Preto - an extract from the UNESCO website: "Founded at the end of the 17th century, Ouro Preto (Black Gold) was the focal point of the gold rush and Brazil's golden age in the 18th century. With the exhaustion of the gold mines in the 19th century, the city's influence declined but many churches, bridges and fountains remain as a testimony to its past prosperity and the exceptional talent of the Baroque sculptor Aleijadinho."

There are more than 9 churches in Ouro Preto and not a single modern building. It was truely an amazing experience to just stroll on the cobblestone hilly streets of this old town for 2 days. We also made a friend here from Estonia, Martin the architect. He is a solo traveller, exploring Brazil. During dinner we exchanged stories about our countries. It was really interesting to hear what is was like living in a Soviet Union country. It would be great to visit this place as part of eastern Europe one day and we hope to have Martin pay us a visit in South Africa one day!

After this, we headed for Rio de Janeiro...CARNIVAL!!!