It's been a while, so I thought I'd better catch up on the last few days events.

We left Rio Grande and headed for the next stop of Porto Alegre. Nothing much happened apart from getting the bikes washed after they got covered in fine sand in Punta del Diablo (Uruguay) - lovely and shiney. Oh I should mention I dropped my bike! How did that happen ?

Well we arrived in Porto Alegre and I was attempting to follow very closely but a small van decided to shadow every move Drew made, every turn, every junction. Finally at set of traffic lights he let me in front, then proceeded once again to follow both of us. What did this guy want? Seemed too much of a coincidence him going in the same direction! Shortly after we found our hotel. b*****! It was on a slope and my lowered bike doesn't take too kindly to these. So I tried to manoever passed Drew's bike to park, but stupidly I clipped his pannier, which overbalanced the bike and it started to fall ........onto the bloody van that had appeared right next to me!

His little van now had a very lovely big scratch down the side of the drivers door......we both picked the bike up - which was at that time wedged up against the drivers door at a 45 degree angle!!

"No problem" he said "just thought I'd warn you about riding too quickly in the city!". Then he said goodbye and was off.

Next couple of days were spent getting to Rio de Janeiro, so no great stories there. The roads got a bit more interesting, heading through the foothills of the local mountain range, some good bends and some damned rain.

The roads we're on at the moment are dual carriageways, which are the main routes for the transport lorries, coaches and every other b*****. So plenty use of every available piece of Tarmac is used to get by all this traffic - this does include the hard shoulder ! And along with all this traffic are the usual road works, and getting stuck behind lorries going uphill is a bloody pain in the arse ........but these roads get us to where we need to be and are reasonably good quality.

Oh! And then theres the damned tolls!!!

Further south you may pay R$0.90 but nearer Rio de Janeiro ......R$4.80. They're not as frequent but they hate you paying with the small notes.