Hey Folks!

Hope all is well where you are?!

We got into Paraty yesterday and guess what... It was raining !! We took a local bus which was a bit of an adventure but managed grab a seat whereas some of the locals had to stand up for the 2 hour ride! Walked from the bus station to our hotel while it was dingy and damp and on first impressions the it looked like a right little grotty town. There was also a big parade throught the street in honor of the local electorial candidates that were trying to get people to vote for them, was slightly intimidating! Had a buffet dinner that evening and afterwards went for an amazing ice cream in this small little ice cream shop that had loads of flavours and loads of toppings - it was good!! We went for a stoll through the old town after dinner as the evening turned out to be really nice and decided Paraty wasn´t that bad after all. It actually looked quite pretty with little cobbled streets and a little river. The restaurants we walked past looked really nice but way too expenive for travellers!!

Today we woke up and the weather is gorgeous. A few of our group went to the beach but we went with a few others to see some small waterfalls (can´t remember the name), they were brilliant fun. Swam in the rock pools, they were freezing and we were sliding down the waterfalls into the pool at the bottom. We saw some young lad slide down the rocks on his feet like he was surfing - what a nutter!! After we went to a Cachasa distillery (traditional Brazilian liquor) which is made from sugar cane. It was locally run and pretty simple, we bought a bottle of passionfruit flavour which was nice but reall strong like neat vodka! Tonight we are going to an organised house party with a BBQ and free caipirinhas (Brazilian cocktail). Going to get well drunk (although probably not a good idea as we have a 6 hour bus journey to Sau Paulo tomorrow where we get a connecting, over night bus for 18 hours to Igussa Falls)!

Speak soon

Love from us both