One Day in Rio, then straight to Peru

Rio de Janeiro...City of God


Well, John is gone... We had almost a full month of traveling together and now he is off to go work in a big law firm, and get married. All in all, I think he is really looking forward to it. He is going back to a good job and a great girl. Looking back, we really had a good time. From our Steaks and Cigars in BA, to our leisure and relaxing in Florianapolis, to our beach front honeymoon getaway in Bahia we had a blast. I hope this trip was just what he needed to blow of some steam after the bar exam, and before the official start of the real world.

In the last month we took relaxation to a whole new level. Although, physically we covered quite a bit of ground.


We spent our last day in Rio de Janeiro. Sadly, we both had food poisoning that we picked up somewhere in Bahia. I am not really sure what happened. It could have been bad food, or maybe we drank the water by accident. Nonetheless, in Rio I was waiting for an Alien to jump out of Johns belly at any second. Early on, he was doubled over in pain, and much worse off than I. At least the food poisoning waited until our last day to rear its ugly head.


When you only have one day to see all of Rio De Janeiro


We did manage, through the pain, to hang glide from one of the mountaintops overlooking the city. What a great way to end our travels! However, as soon as we hit the ground and the adrenaline rush slowed down, John promptly vomited in the sand. We both started popping Cipro (medicine that crushes any and all bacteria known to man). Currently, I am just starting to get back to normal.

After moving so much for the last few weeks, I find myself a little tired. These last few days in Lima I have been taking it easy in my hostel (Loki, which is one of the best I have stayed in). Today we sat around and watched Life Aquatic with Bill Murray (great movie). Two more of my best friends Chris and Don arrive tomorrow night to take on Macchu Pichu. We have a day or two here in Lima, then we take off for Cusco and the Inca trail. I would compare my excitement to what I felt right when I secured the Antarctica trip. This is going to be a blast. Many of the people in my hostel are fresh off the Inca trail. They are raving about the nightlife in Cusco and the Macchu Pichu experience.

In summary, I am not doing a whole hell of a lot until Don and Chris show up. I have spent a lot of time in a nice little cafe next to the hostel that has wireless access. Today I have eaten all three meals here. I feel like I am Norm from Cheers when I walk through the doors. Although I only can only understand about how of what my new friends are saying (thank God Im out of Brazil and back into the Spanish speaking world), they all smile and wave at me every time I step foot in the place.

Peru is CHEAP. Brazil is EXPENSIVE. I think I am heading to Bolivia next where it is rumored that its so cheap its "free".

Some thoughts on Brazil:


A Tale of Two Cities: From Ipanama Beach.....To the Favelas




I was scared shitless to go to Rio de Janerio. The combination of the extremely negative coverage in the press, and nightmare stories from people I have me along the way painted a horrific picture in the back of my mind. In contrast to my expectations, I found Rio to be beautiful city, with an overwhelmingly positive vibe. Nonetheless, the site of the Hilltop Favelas (shantytowns) gave me the chills. Located right next to the wealthiest areas in Rio, are the ominous slums run by drug gangs. The biggest one houses 250,000 people. After talking to some people who toured them, apparently this particular Favela is run by a 23 year old drug lord. There are 12 year olds on the street corners with automatic weapons. Brazil, with the eighth largest Gross Domestic Product in the entire world, has no control of a neighborhood inside one of its biggest cities and tourist attractions. Although this is disturbing, I found myself completely fascinated with the Favelas. If we had another day John and I would have taken the tour.

Sidenote: So far this year there have 560 murders in the state of Rio de Janerio.


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Notes:

> My waitress in the cafe I am sitting in right now is either laughing at me, or flirting with me in some sort of hard core Peruvian manner of which I am unaware of. I am going to go with laughing... Although, I am not sure why. Hmm....

> I have been getting consistently destroyed in Ping Pong by other people in the hostel and I am really, really not happy about it. I am making way to many easy mistakes. DAMN IT!

> I might need to rant a little bit... See, heres the deal, I bought a video camera before Antarctica to capture my experience. That was a month ago.... I still cannot get this FING thing to work with my Mac. I need to buy software, but they wont let me buy it because I am out of the country ( I think). First of all, why should I have to buy additional software. Second of all, I have been trying to do this for a month and I have a lot of good video and IM PISSED.

> Loki is filled to the brim with Irish and English people. Good times.

> Don, Chris, and I fly to Cusco on Tuesday Morning. I think we get on the 4 day trail on Thursday.

> To answer any questions..No, I did not take the picture at the top of this page. However, I did rip it off of the internet.

The Beaches of Bahia- Arrial D'Ajuda, Trancoso, Espello, and Caraiva

View from the top of the hill in Trancoso

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After Salvador, John and I took off for the beaches of Bahia. We jumped on a 35 minute flight from Salvador to Porto Seguro. From there, we ended up taking a ferry from Porto Seguro with a Peruvian girl named Aralyn (more on her later) to a quaint little beach town called Arrial D'Ajuda.

Sidenote: I have realized that I am completely inept at pronouncing and remembering the names of any and all Brazilian towns. John has been consistently
laughing at me since we got down here.

So, we arrived in the off season. On the 21st it turned to Autumn. Its been dead everywhere we have been in Brazil thus far. On the bright side, its been nice as we have been able to negotiate really good fairs in the hostels/hotels.

In Arrial D'Ajuda, we stayed at a nice hostel with a pool and air conditioning (rare) and were hanging out with this Peruvian girl that we initially thought was really cool. After a few hours, we learned that she was far from cool. In fact, we nicknamed her the fun vacuum. She vacuumed up every bit of fun of that we had. The problem, was that ¨the Hoover¨ would not go away. She would knock on our door every morning to go to the beach. Furthermore, whenever we would go out with her over the course of about a day and a half she would bitch about how much everything cost.

In short, the fun vacuum had to go. John and I came up with a diabolical plan involving renting a car and running very quickly. Lucky for us, it worked and we were able to give her the slip. It took almost four hours before our capacity to have fun returned.

We rented a sweet Volkswagen Gol. When I say it was sweet, I really mean that it was a piece of shit. Thank God John remembered how to drive stick shift from some adventures he had in Europe 5 years ago.

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We drove south for about an hour and ended up in the hippie town of Transcoso. We were there for about a day. It was really beautiful with a small white church overlooking the beach on a giant green hill. While we were there, we hit up a beach, watched some local kids play soccer extremely well, and met a scary American guy.

Michael (50) (did not catch the last name) was the epitome of everything in life that I do not want to become. He pulled up next to us in a bar, after hearing us speak English. Apparently, Michael was a homeopathic (natural medicine) doctor in Boston for years, and ran a very successful practice. In the end, he sold it for millions and moved to Brazil. He had been here for 5 years, living in Trancoso for the last year and half. Let me state it very plainly: This guy was pathetic and miserable. Nonetheless, he gave us an interesting look at the separation of classes here, differences in the people of the different parts of Brazil, and of what it is like for a Gringo to live among Bahians. All in all, the guy hated everything about his life. John kept saying to him, "If you hate it here so much, why not just move back to the states?". I think he is beyond such a move. There was a blank look in his eyes. He spoke of how corrupt the local government can be here, and how much he longed for meaningful conversation. He was a really successful guy at one time, and decided to vanish to Brazil. From what we gather, he has no contacts in the US and really has no idea what is going on back home. These beach towns in Bahia are an amazing place to visit, but I would not recommend moving here after taking one look at this lost soul. Or, maybe we just ran into a complete weirdo and I am reading way to much into it.

Note to self: Do not live in some remote place and expect paradise. Also, do not become a total wackjob.

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The next day we set off for Caraiva, the remotest of remote beaches two hours south of Transcoso. The entire way to Caraiva is on a dirt road. When I say dirt, I mean a washed out, animal filled, potholed mess. Johns driving was truly put the test. Especially so when we almost ran head on into a herd of Water Buffalo (They were either Water Buffalo or really weird looking cows).




On the way we stopped at what is apparently one of the best beaches in Brazil, Espello. It was expensive, but really nice. On one part of the beach you can pull clay off of a cliff, put in the water, then rub it all over yourself. I do not know what its called but apparently its the stuff they use at spas to give facials and mud masks and such. We chilled out all day, ate a giant fish, and were on our way down the bumpy messed up road to Cariava.


My real life Corona Commercial in Espello, if only I had a cell phone to throw in the water....

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We arrived here in Caravia a few hours later, (that is where I am writing), parked our car, and paid some locals to shuttle us from one side of a river to the other to get to the town. The town is absolutely empty except for some locals, some Argentine couples, and John an I. All of the roads are sand, there is no electricity, (generators are turned on at night) and everything is beachfront

After enjoying a lovely dinner of shrimp risotto for two, John and I spent our time strolling the white, sandy, moonlit beaches of Caraiva. We pointed out the constellations in one of the brightest skies that I have ever seen. The waves were crashing against the shore with a thunderous, rhythmic, pounding. The shadows of the palm trees hung ominously above us for miles around. We sipped our drinks and then gazed softly into each other eyes, and remembered that we are in fact not gay (not that there is anything wrong with that). We stumbled upon a honeymooners paradise, minus the requisite female presence. Johns a really good guy, and a good friend, but, at this point I would sell him to the gypsies (if in fact there are Brazilian gypsies) just to ¨see¨ a women.

After we realized that total gayness (again, not that there is anything wrong with that) of the situation, the conversation shifted very quickly. We discussed next years Fantasy Football draft in depth (John and I are both previous champions). Then we began chugging beer, arm wrestling, and played a quick round of bloody knuckles. We do not know anything about the WWE, Nascar, or beef jerky, but we discussed them all at length anyway.


Our beautiful Honeymoon Bungalow in Caraiva


View from the inside out

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Notes:

> Johns negotiates like a true lawyer. He has saved us a good bit of cha ching.
He is a big fan of the fake walk out. I will say, that pretty much every time the owners/proprietors chase us out the door lowering the price.

> Vacuum is a very difficult word to spell (what’s up with the two U's)

> I have decided that I need an multinational crew to travel with. Therefore, I can spread the work out and make this the most interactive blog on planet earth while still enjoying my travels. John and I were discussing things. I definitely need someone that is good at spelling, computers, and video work (since I have been trying to get video up for weeks but can't quite hack it). We were thinking a Chinese videographer with a drinking problem could be entertaining. Other possibilities include a sherpa and a former spelling bee champion. Post a comment if you have any suggestions.