The intention for this blog was to update it every week or two with our goings on... As it happens we are only 5 days in and we are already overloaded with stories of amazing places and awesome people so we are gonna have to do it more frequently so we dont forget anything or anyone.

Our flight to Brazil was Loooooooong. Johannesburg - London (5 hour lay over), London - Madrid (6 hour lay over), Madrid - Sao Paulo. Needless to say we were both completely zonked when we arrived and were very anxious to get to our hostel. It was a quaint and quiet hostel in the center of Sau Paolo. Not much going on there so we took the oppurtunity to chill, catch up on some sleep and do some walking around the area we were in. I think you could probably be in Sau Paolo for months and not even manage to explore half of it - we flew into the city early in the morning and were absolutely amazed at the size of it - it just goes on forever!

We left the next morning for the bus station using the local underground system and we were quite impressed with how easily we got on. We took a 6 hour bus to get to Rio and were blown away when we arrived at our hostel. Our cabbie (a funny Brazilian guy who was obsessed with Elvis Presley and spent the 30 minute taxi drive seranading us with all his favourites) dropped us at the Ipanema Beach House where we are immediately welcomed by a large group of people At first we thought they were all travelling together but as it turns out, it was a few groups of people who had just become friends while staying at the hostel. It is in the heart of ipanema, with a large wooden deck outside with a pool, hammocks and a communal eating and chilling are. We were put in a 6 bed mixed dorm with an American, a Peuto Rican and a greek guy. We spent our first night meeting all the other travellers - alot of them were finishing long trips very similar to ours but in the opposite direction so we have been chatting for hours about places theyve been to that tehy recommend, places to stay at and places to avoid. heir advise is so much more valuable than anything we got from the lonely planet.

We were lucky on the first full day in Rio to have a beautiful day and so took the oppurtunity to go up Cocovado to the Chrsit statue.The view is just spectacular... we went up on a cig train from the base of the mountain - a group of local musicians got on half way through and serenaded us with some authentic Brazilian samba tunes. At the top we wondered around and got some refreshing juices at a little cafe - We sat with our pineapple and watermelon drinks soaking in the atmosphere and the fact that we had another 7 months of that ahead of us.

We got back to the hostel early to bring in the fast with a delicious pasta we made in the communal kitchen. We found a Chabad shul about 4 blocks down from our hostel to go to for Kol Nidrei. it turnded out to be a Sephardi shul and I was amazed at how different the service was. Despite that though, it felt really good to know that you can be anywhere in the world and be welcomed wholeheartedly into another community just because you are a Jew.

We were very lucky with the weather for the fast - it was cold and rainy all day so we sat on the stoep of the hostel next to the communal lounge and played cards and chatted iwth the people coming and going all day. Most people were very interested to hear that we were Jewish and asked alot of questions about Yom Kippur and Judaism.

We went to a fabulous sushi place around the corner from our hostel to break the fast and joined a large kings game at the hostel before heading off to an area in Rio called Lapa where the roads are blocked off to traffic and the locals wonder around the streets from bar to bar. We sat a table at bar with a couple we met from England (Sophie and Paul), a guy from Madrid (Cesar) and a Brzilian guy from Sao Paolo (Daniel). Caparinhas were strong but really good........

Sunday was another overcast day and so we decided to take a tour to the Favelas. We had a most briliant guide who took us around one of the Favelas. What both Jeff and I Love about travelling is gettting to see how the locals in all the countries live. This tour allowed us to walk amongst the locals in their environment, their neighbourhood and look into their homes and lives. We took the local transportation, motorbikes, on of the 3 roads in the Favela to get to the top and walked back down, stopping along the way to speak to the people, look out on the spectacular views and to hear interesting facts and stories about the druglords and the people who live their. On many occasions we were asked not to take pictures because we were passing guys on the street who are wanted by police who walk around proudly with their Ak47s. Amazingly though, there was absoultely no hostility or annoyance of us being there. In fact, the guide told us that they enjoy having us around because they feel proud to ive in a place where the gringos (foreigners) like to visit. A higjlight for me so far definately!

We met a really cool guy on our travels from England named John who had his last day of a one year round the world trip with us on Monday. We headed off on the metro to an atera in Rio called Santa Teresa. We took a tram for a whole 60c to the top of a high hill with amazing views going up and walked down the cobble stoned streets talking about his experiences and favourite moments. made us realise how much we have to look forward to!! We ended off in another area called Lapa where an eccentric Chilean artist has spent the last 20 years tiling a flight of stairs in the area with tiles from all over the world. We hiked up the 215 steps lookinf out for SA(which we found 2 of) and were lucky enough at the top to come across the artisit himself wh allowed one of the Belgian girls we were with to cement one of the tiles onto the stairs. On the way back to the hostel we decided to get off the train at Copacabana and walk the way home along the beach. It was a beautiful time of day - the sun was setting and the beach itself was quiet and relaxed. We love watching the locals on the beach who play socer volleyball - which is volleyball but with no hands allowed so they either have to header, kick chest the ball over the net.

On our last day in Rio we were hit with the most glorious weather and took advantage by heading to Ipanema beach. 2 hours passed like 5 minutes and we had to head back to make our way to the bus station for a 16 hour journey to Florianopolis. Unfortunately for us we had left it too late. Our bus was to leave at 4:30 so we left the hostel on the local bus at 3:30 assuming that would be more than enough time but the traffic was horrific and we knew we would be late. At a point we decided to ask the driver how long it would take to the station in so we could assess getting off and taking a taxi but she assured us that we would be there in 5 minutes which would have guiven us 10 minutes to run to the bus, but 40 minutes later we were still sitting anxously on the bus. At 4:35 Jeff decided it was time for us to hit the road and try run there instead of sitting in traffic in case we could make it there if the bus was running late. We quickly realisd though that we were still kilometeres away and we would never make it. We struggled to find a taxi and there were in sane queues to get back onto the bus, the sun was setting and the tears were being held back. Anyway, we eventually got to the station an hour late and stumbled onto a really helpful guy from the bus company who helped us change our tickets to a bus that evening for a place called Curitiba and from there we caught another bus to Flori... Funnily enough we landed up saving money but lost about 7 hours. So, one week in and we have made our first boo boo but - lesson learnt!!

Next stop Flori and then Aguacu......