From one amazing phenomenon to another, but this time a man made one. The Itiapu Dam is a joint venture between Brazil and Paraguay and dams the Parana River on the border between the two countries. Like the Iguazu Falls the statistics are impressive. It is 7.2km long and 225m high. The lake it created is over 100km long and 7 km wide. It can generate 14,000 megawatts of electricity - perhaps enough to supply the electricity needs of over 10 million European hom...

Awesome is a word so overused that it has come to lose its meaning. However sometimes one comes across a natural phenomenon that truly merits the description. The Iguazu Falls, Cataratas do Iguaçu to give them their Portuguese name (we are still in Brazil) is one such. The raw statistics are impressive. Generally considered to be the largest waterfall system in the world consisting of between 250 and 300 separate falls (the exact number depending on the water l...

Some things we've learnt about São Paulo. It is an ethnically very diverse city with skin colour ranging from people who look as if they would suffer from serious sunburn on a Scottish winter's day to people who are obviously directly descended from the African slaves brought here is such numbers. That is great for us because it means we don't obviously stand out as tourists. There are over 1 million people of Japanese descent living here making it the largest...

The title for today's blog is a song by King Crimson. It is an anagram of 'heat in the jungle' and describes a member of the bands less than friendly encounter with some Rastafarians in London in the 1970s. It includes his account of the meeting with the repeated phrase "this is a dangerous place". That is probably how many people imagine São Paulo. São Paulo- third biggest city in the world with a population of perhaps 25 million. And flying in over miles and...