Oi! (Thats hi over here)!

We´ve not written for ages and got tons to say. hi it´s Ruth now sorry for any spelling mistakes there are.

anyway its my tern to wright, so Ilha Grand was great as a place, we stayed for 4 nights. it was described to us as beeing like paridice and altought nether of us would tell it that way its as cloes as weve been so far. lets star with the big problem we had with the place, are room smelt like a under grouned Londen public toylet and that was on a good day i went to complain but all thay did was offer to sell me a boat tour oh well. other than it stank and we felt ill and the staff were a bit funny looking we had a brill time. mi-britt was in the hostel next door so we had a friend to shear are exsperiances with. on the 1st night we had a bbq and met a guy called depesh as in depesh mode and we went on some boat trip wih him. cazz say les detail cos weve got a lot to say ok.

we went on 2 boat trips the 1st was to a lagoon and i got to swim with some fishes and the 2nd was to a beach which had sand like powder and a really cool sine that said

"take nothing but a photo, kill nothing but time, leave nothing but your foot prints"

Well that what the man who traslated it said it said he could of been a lier thought. althought the majority of the people we have meat have been so kined and hepfull, and not just the ones that are payed to help but normal people to. except the tramp who chaced us she wasent hepfull or kined she was ceazze. any way i think cazz should tipe fpr a bit and get us back on track i seem to ramball on a bit dont you think, dont worrie ill be back.

Right, It´s Cazz! So the amazing beach was called Lopez Mendes. We had to get a boat round then walk for 30 mins through the jungle which was exhausting (we´re so unfit)! On the way we saw a pack of wild howler monkeys and we fed them, it was amazing. The beach was amazing too, sand like snow that squeaked when you walked on it! I should also add that the boat drivers were a little crazy and were smokng weed constantly throughout the 2 trips!

On the last night me, Ruth and Mai-Britt went for a meal and a few drinks, we rounded the Ilha Grande off with a midnight skinny dip in the sea!

Saturday took us back to Rio, we were exhausted but decided to go to the Samba party trip in one of the favellas. Its in a massive building where they practice for the February carnival. It was one of the best nights of my life. Before we went in we were getting stared at in the street and felt a bit wary, but inside the atmosphere was amazing, never experienced anything like that. After a few caprinhas we soon got into the swing of things, but were unbelievably harrassed by the local guys. I need to wear a dark wig and brown contact lenses in Brazil!

We got in at 6AM so the rest of our time in Rio was a bit more chilled. I rode up into Favella Rocinha (the biggest favella, Ruth chose not to go) on the back of a motorbike and then walked back down with a giude. It was quite shocking to see such a contrast in the way of life to the rest of Rio, but we were made to feel very welcome, visiting the local school where our trip money goes. When I get the pics up check them out because there are some crazy stories behind them. We had to put our cameras away for the last ten minutes walk because thats where the drug gangs are and we walked past the gang members who had guns. Unbelievable. The police are too scared to into the favellas because they get shot.

Our last day in Rio me and Ruth made our way to Tijuca Forest - the biggest rainforest in a city in the world. A group of bigger monkeys swung through the trees with us as we walked along. And on our last night we went round to Amora´s (our friend from Parati) whose favourite sayings are "You´re so crazy and cute, its amazing" haha.

So we needed a few days rest and went to a retreat in the jungle 2 hours north of Rio for 3 nights. We got lost on the way and ended up in a hippy town called Sanna. Everyone there was stoned and no one spoke a word of English. My Portuguese phrase book is very limited and we were feeling slightly panicked about what to do. In the end 2 local guys gave us a lift for 70 Reals (About 18 pounds) to the hostel in a wreck of a VW Beetle!

When we first arrived at the retreat we thought what the heck have we done, but it turned out to be amazing and we have both been offered jobs there if we ever want to go back! We stayed with the family who run it, they cooked vegetarian food for us, we played with their 3 lovely kids and went trekking through the jungke and swimming in the waterfalls and river. Although....there were these massive flat spiders all over the rocks and carbs in the water so we spent most of our time being slightly hysterical, it was sooo funny! In the evenings we had bonfires by the river and I entertained with the guitar (sadly I´m really not that good). I also got charged by a very randy horse which was horrible but amusing to look back on. We both legged it to the edge of a cliff and I was about to climb a tree in my panic when it back off. We´re so not country girls!

On Sunday we spent most of the day travelling to Sao Paulo. Its a concrete jungle, full of pollution. I don´t know if we´re staying in a bad area, but there are a lot of people sleeping rough and loads of sex shops, we feel more threatened here than we did in Rio. Thankfully we´ve only had one full day here and tomo we have a 3AM start to fly to Buenos Aires where we have plans to meet some travellers from Rio and some of Ruth´s extended family.

Brazil has been amazing and we´re sorry to be saying bye but the adventure must continue! Sorry if this has gone on a bit, I think we´ve left loads out too. Bedtime now. Hope everyone is well. We love hearing from you. Ruth will write more next time but is feeling a little off so has gone to bed (don´t worry I´m looking after her).

With love,

Cazz and Ruth xxxx

P.S. I tried to upload lots of pics today but it didn´t work so will try again in Argentina.

P.P.S We will NOT be uploading skinny dipping pics hehe xx