Brazil

After the adventurous border crossing and badly slept night in the bus we arrived in Porto Alegre, Brazil. The city was quite nice but way too busy for our taste, so we spent the day in the sun walking around the city with a group of young guys from Manaus.

Next day we hopped on bus again, this time to Florianopolis, which is a modern and fancy city at the entrance to Ilha de Santa Catarina island. It's a hot spot for surfers, sun worshippers and party people. We decided once again to get away from the crowds and head towards a town called Barra da Lagoa. We stayed in the best hostel ever, Barra Beach Club. Free Caipirinhas every day! The view from the hostel:



The beach:

Exploring the Atlantic rainforest and beaches :

We ended up staying in Barra for five nights instead of three and still it wasn't enough. Spent the days hiking, tanning, snorkeling (saw our first sea horse!) and just watching the local fishermen.

 

 

the weather turned rainy and we decided to move on, so we booked a bus to one of our most awaited sights, Foz do Iguaçu (Iguazu waterfalls). We stayed on the Brazilian side and did day trips to the falls first to the Brazilian side and Argentinian side on the next day. The photos speak for themselves:

 

From Iguaçu the journey continues again towards the empanada heaven known also as Argentina.

 

Crossing borders

As mentioned crossing the brazilian border indeed was not as easy as hoped. We did the best we could to find the right way of doing so by asking a lot of people a lot of questions and with the collected information we thought to be prepared to try it.

The problems about crossing this border at this place are that the uruguayan and the brazilian immigration offices where you get the exit (Uruguay) and the entry (Brazil) stamps are far away from each other with a town called Chuy between them.

From Punta del Diablo we tried to catch the same bus as our german friend, and with help of the hostel staff via phone we found out that we had to go to Chuy to an office to get our tickets and jump on the bus, while our german friend was supposed to wait at a random kilometer mark somewhere along the highway near Punta del Diablo (at 23:30).

As told we took the bus to Chuy and told the driver to stop at the uruguayan immigration before Chuy to get our passports stamped with the exit stamps. This worked great and we were confident when we approached Chuy, to find our office in a little town (that's what the locals have told us). But Chuy isn't small and the office was just another travel agency so we hurried through the streets with our backpacks just to find the office 10 mins before closing.

So we got our tickets and thought we could spend the 7 hrs until the bus picks us up at the local bus terminal but then we were lucky enough to ask at the office where the pick up will be. Here we were told to walk back about 1km to the uruguayan immigration and to wait there because the bus doesn't even come to Chuy.

So we spent 5hrs in the park in Chuy and walked back at around 22:00. While arriving at the immigration we were told that our bus wouldn't come before 01:00 and not at 23:55 as we were told in the travel agency.

Precisely at 01:00 the bus did arrive and we were happy to see our friend smiling at us through the window (he didn't wait at the kilometer mark, he went back to the next bigger junction, afraid of the trucks passing him with 100km/h in the dark in the middle if nowhere). At the brazilian border we saw the lady from the bus personel walking away with our passports while the bus drove off and didn't know if we will ever see them again, but we just drove to a gas station to fill up the tank...

After all it would've been smarter to buy the ticket in Montevideo already and leave the staff in the bus deal with all the formalities. We wanted to share this story to help our fellow travellers dealing with the same situation.

 

Time to chill

From Buenos Aires we got on the ferry to Colonia del Sacramento, a beautiful, old town in Uruguay. It is a perfect place to get lost and just enjoy the day. Perfect for a day trip of why not longer. Lazy traffic, cute cobblestone streets, beautiful plants, colourful houses and a lighthouse keep you busy just wandering around. We were so amazed by the calmness of Uruguay, that instead of returning to Buenos Aires like originally planned, we decided to keep travelling north.

Because not having planned anything, we decided to take a few days in Montevideo to figure out what we wanted to see in Uruguay. Montevideo was an alright city, the "old town" was not really that old, but it was nice just to sit there and watch the fishermen at work. We were still getting used to South American way of life, food and language. After studying our bible, the Lonely Planet book, we were ready to move on to a next destination.

Our next two days we spent without any connection to the world outside in the tiny hippie town called Cabo Polonio. Cabo Polonio consists mostly of sand. And maybe a bit more sand. Getting there sounded more tricky than it actually was. The normal bus drops you off in the right intersection (if you asked the driver to do so), and you just wait until someone comes and takes you there in a kind of truck on the sandy "road" (path?), not suitable for any other than heavy 4WD's. In South America these things just work somehow. No schedules, no price lists, no information of any kind, but if you talk to people and trust your luck, things seem to work in your favor.

Cabo Colonio was a fun experience, but it surely would have been even nicer in the summer, when restaurants are actually open and the weather is better and you could really enjoy being on the beach. It was nice and warm during the day, but the nights are a bit too chilly and windy (which does not stop the mosquitoes). It is a perfect place for a campfire, food and friends. Days there we spent walking around the beach, sandboarding, spotting the sea lion colony that lives there and enjoying the calming sound of crashing waves.

Since there was no internet, most electricity comes from sunlight and the use of water is very limited, so after a few days it felt good to get to Punta del Diablo, a relaxed surfer town on the coast, and just have a nice hot shower. Very much recommended, if you are into doing nothing and relaxing.

Now we are back on track along the east coast heading north, two days before (hopefully) entering Brazil. Crossing the border sounds like a bit of a adventure or a pain in he ass, but we are sure we'll get on the other side somehow.

Uruguay has been absolutely beautiful with cute little towns, changing landscapes and relaxed attitude towards everything. Tranquilo!

 

The beginning

After a time that seemed like years we finally met outside the Buenos Aires airport. We couldn't really realize that our year of travelling had just begun.

Our hostel was located in the district of San Telmo, which is probably the most laid back area of the city. It's full of markets, art, little cafes, noisy streets, paintings on the building walls and music everywhere. Only sunday markets in San Telmo can keep you busy all day.

Buenos Aires felt like the perfect starting place for our travels. It was not too dramatically different to home, being a big, modern city, but you definitely get the feeling of being absolutely somewhere else.

We spent one day exploring the impressive Recoleta cemetery and the market in a park right next to it. We tried to do some shopping too in Florida street, too bad it happened to be a public holiday, 1st of May. In Palermo we spent most of the day in the zoo wondering what kind of crazy creatures we were feeding. Rest of the day we spent relaxing and sunbathing in the huge green parks of Palermo.

 

In Buenos Aires we fell in love with empanadas. For lunch. For dinner. Anytime. Cheap, good and easy.

After five days we thought we had seen enough people and decided to catch a ferry to Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay, a small, quiet town just a few hours away.

 

 

The plan

A finnish girl and a swiss guy try to travel for about a year (as we hope...) with the money saved over some years. Starting point is Buenos Aires, Argentina. From there on we'll head north through Uruguay, Brazil, Paraguay, back to Argentina and by passing through Chile we'll travel Bolivia and Peru and end up in Ecuador or Colombia. Then we'll head over to Asia by whatever cheap flight we can get and travel around until we run out of money. On the list is Southeast Asia, Indonesia, India and Nepal. As the plan changes from day to day we are not making too specific plans and take it as it comes.