2008 approaches the end

We are still here in Vitoria, at the small roomed but nice Bristol hotel. When we returned to our room after a stroll around town (no favelas this time) we found a quarter bottle of fizz and a couple of champers glasses.

Now that's good service. T pointed out that it was "Surprise and Delight". Which rather amused me. On my "Customer Journey" that is staying at the Bristol hotel, it's a nice thing.

I am not being brainwashed.

We are about to discover what new year Brazil style actually is. Expect an update when I'm capable.


Happy New Year

Vitoria - still

We have mostly been a chillin' for the last few days. We are staying over at the beaches in Vitoria and found a nice room in a lovely hotel, so we've camped here for a bit. We did investigate going up the coast, but it all looks a bit too complicated and they don't have any of those nice buses we had in Argentina. There is also the matter of some unfinished business (of which, more later).

So, we have decide to stay here for New Year. We have to move from this hotel, as it is fully booked for the celebrations (and, no doubt, seriously expensive too) and so we decided to check in to the Radisson on the beach opposite. It looks new and is reasonably priced, so we walked in there to book a room.

Apparently they can't book rooms at the desk, so we have to send an email. After two emails and no reply, we were seriously questioning how good a hotel this was going to be.

Anyway, whilst I'm on the subject, we needed to do our laundry. After wandering around town on a Saturday looking for a lavanderia, we finally gave up, as they all seemed to be closed. This caused a small problem, as I was out of clean T-Shirts.

To remedy this, we went to the shopping centre to see what we could find. We wandered into a shop called "TACO", which, whilst sounding like a fast food joint from Mexico, looked an awful lot like GAP. I walked in and was spotted straight away and asked if I needed help. Given my total inability to convey "No thanks, I'm just looking" in Portuguese, I was immediately discovered to be an Ingles speaker and the English speaking shop assistant was summoned to deal with me. The problem, it turned out, was that all the super-fatso T-Shirts had been sold in the run-up to Christmas and so the combined sales force of the whole shop was conscripted into searching for the last GG (Extra Large) T-Shirts in the shop.

I do not look good in Lime Green.

Finally picking a dark blue, a light blue and a white one, we paid for our purchases and said goodbye to Brazil GAP.

After a couple of lazy days, punctuated mostly by:

• Drinking beer in to the sights and sounds of "Best of the 80's" videos (including such masterpieces as "Take on me" by a-ha; "Walk of Life" by Dire Straits; two interchangeable Erasure songs; "Another brick in the wall" by Pink Floyd ... you get the idea)
  
• Eating moqueca (fish stew) a few times (tasty)
  
• Swimming
  
• Reading books
  
• Taking the odd stroll past a favela
  

We decided that we had to have an active day on Monday.

First of all, we walked back to all the closed lavanderias to discover that it would take them a week to do our washing. Ooops. Luckily, in one of the shops, another customer told us about a laundromat. Off we toddled. We dropped off our washing with the nice lady at the laundromat and arranged to return 3 hours later. Bliss.

Wandering through the blistering hot streets of Vitoria meant that we needed to stop for water. After finding a nice cafe, we had water, Coke, cheesy balls, sausage bits and two of the sweetest, stickiest deserts in the world. Finally we turned up at the HSBC to see if they would change some travellers cheques for us.

Now, banks in Brazil (much like the rest of Latin America (and some parts of Europe)) seem to be semi-fortified affairs. In order to get into one, you have to nod politely at the chap with the shotgun, pass through a metal detector and then go through some set of doors that ensure only one person can enter at once and, perhaps more importantly, leave at once. Given this increased security, T stayed out in the lobby bit (where the ATMs are) underneath an A/C outlet, whilst I went in and asked if I could do a spot of Cambio.

I got to the front of the queue and asked in my best "Lonely Planet Brazilian Portuguese phrase book" foreign "Do you have a foreign exchange office?" There was a big smile from the lady behind the desk, who promptly stood up and scuttled off to the back of the bank. Moments later she reappeared behind me and asked me to follow her. I was ushered into the "HSBC Premier" area. It was at this point that it got a bit surreal.

I gesticulated to T (through the lightly frosted glass separating us in the Premier lounge from the proles) to come through. She couldn't miss this.

We ordered water (without gas) from the be-aproned waitress as we waited in the leather armchairs to be served. Eventually I was summoned into an inner sanctum to effect our transaction. Luckily I had T's "first direct" card on me, so we were identified as bona fide HBSC customers. The woman dealing with me had to telephone up to find out what to do and, between the three of us, we managed to navigate the endless computer screens to provide me with some cash in exchange for my traveller's cheques. We stayed a while to split up the cash between us in the safety of this little exception from reality. At one point she came back to swap the piece of paper I had signed for another one - for what reason I have no idea. Smiling and waving goodbye to our new friends, we once more ventured into the sauna that is outside and took a photo - just in case we forgot about it. Behind the bank is the favela we wandered past on Sunday.


Premier, no less

We then hailed a taxi and asked him to take us to the train station. We wanted to see if we could get back to Belo Horizonte by train in the new year. After the usual near death experience that is riding in a taxi in Latin America, we had a near perfect (i.e. no resorting to wild gesticulations) exchange with the staff at the station and purchased to Executivo class tickets on the 2nd Jan. Feeling pleased with ourselves, we once again imitated crash test dummies as we were transported to pick up our washing and then to a bar for a well earned cold one and chips.



Jobs - done

Due to the lack of taxis, we started to walk back to the hotel and passed a nice looking hotel, right beside the Iate club. We popped in and were welcomed by Danielle and shown the rooms. They were small but have fantastic views and the hotel is right in the centre of everything. As the Radisson was quite so useless, we dumped that idea and booked in for a couple of nights. The only issue is that it might be a bit noisy, but, on New Year's eve - that's par for the course.

Back to our hotel, which has become alot less of a haven now that more people have arrived. We went to bed without our tea.

OLPC

Shameless plug.

OLPC has recently announced the G1G1 program in the UK.

I have just pre-ordered one on Amazon.

http://laptop.org/en/

If you think it's a cool idea, you can order one too.

P.

Don't Smoke

But if you must, this no smoking sign acts as a handy ash tray.


And, whilst we are on the subject, some of the traffic lights over here have four lights, Green (no surprise there), Amber (Orange/Yellow, whatever), Red and, oh, yes another Red. As one red light seems to mean "Keep going if you aren't actually going to hit anything (probably)" then maybe two red lights means something like "Even if the road is clear, STOP, please".

Ilha do Boi

We checked out of the comfortable but basic Comfort hotel and moved operations to the Hotel Ilha do Boi. It is situated on a peninsula in the bay off the beaches of Vitoria. It's another 1970's affair - but this time has been kept modern and is just great. For a very reasonable rate we have a room with a view of the bay and the city and use of various amenities including the circular swimming pool. The sun is on and off and the coastal breeze keeps everything at an acceptable temperature.


Vitoria, Espirito Santo

We have extended our stay to four nights and are contemplating staying in Vitoria for New Year. It seems to be a nice place and most of the visitors are Brazilian and not European or American. That means that the locals have to suffer more of our appalling Portuguese, but that's not a major problem for us.

Our room got a new LCD TV today. The TV that we don't turn on today is more modern that the one we didn't turn on yesterday.

We have also firmed up our plans for the end of the trip. We are going to do more flying that we had hoped, but this is more due to the bus timetable not fitting our exacting requirements than anything else. It's a shame, but there you go. Our last two stops will be Salvador and Recife. We won't be stopping in Rio on the way back (except at the airport).

Feliz Natal

Merry Christmas


Beach Christmas

I don't think it's going to snow today.

I might be wrong.

Colonial towns

We rose early to join our tour. We were joined by a Brazilian couple who hailed from the south of the country. This meant we were going to an additional town on our tour. After an hour of high speed mini-bus driving we arrived at the town of Conhongas where there are a set of sculptures by a ex-slave who had no hands and was nicknamed 'little cripple'. Apparently he was very important in the furthering of the artistic style. His name is Antonio Francisco Lisboa, or Aleijadinho. He was certainly prolific.


Church, old

After Conhongas, we went to the pretty town on Mariana. Unfortunately, the church was closed, so it was a whistle stop tour.


P and T overlooking Mariana

From Mariana we went to Ouro Preto. Ouro Preto used to be the capital of the state of Minas Gerais until Belo Horizonte was created. It is a pretty, busy town built on a steep hill. There are alot of tourists and churches here. After a while, old churches,inside and out, start looking pretty similar.


Church, also old

A few interesting things we noticed were:

• The extra set of ornate doors inside the churches
  
• The separation of slaves from the free people was enforced for the congregation
  
• The sheer quantity of images of Christ suffering on the cross
  
• The nativity scenes in each church, with baby Jesus missing of course. He gets dropped in at midnight
  
• The quantity of gold, naturally
  

After getting back to the hotel, we got our executive limousine (the same bus we had been in all day) to the airport to fly to Vitoria. The flight was quick and uneventful. The hotel in Vitoria is clean and, apart from the sauna/fridge option of the A/C unit, absolutley fine.

Belo Horizonte

We got up and booked a tour of the city. Within 1/2 an hour we had at our disposal: a guide, an interpreter and a driver. We then did a whistle stop tour of Belo Horizonte, including such sights as Oscar Neimeyer buildings ...

 

Building by Oscar

The second biggest covered football stadium in the world (after the Maracana in Rio)

 

Large

We saw the dressing rooms, the warm-up areas and the chapel. It was great. We then went to see the church by the lake (another Niemeyer creation).

 

Symbolism

We liked our tour so much that we booked the same trio for a day trip the next day to Ouro Preto.

Lunch was in our first Kilo restaurant. These are common in Brazil and are basically a buffet of all sorts of things that you pay for by weight. The food was fresh and very tasty. We had to share a table ... very un-British.

We decided to see when we could catch the train to Vitoria. Everyone seems to say it is an amazing journey. 12 hours by train or 45 mins by plane. In the end we had no choice ... the train was fully booked until the end of the year. With that plan scuppered, we headed back to the hotel for a swim. In the rain.


Swimming in the rain

After chatting to our new friend for a while, we went to the other side of town for a yummy dinner. Back late for an unsettled night's sleep, after negotiating a late check-out that let us have a quick break between our tour and leaving for the airport.

Buzios to BH: +13 hours -30 years

Our last day in Buzios was a quiet affair, as befits a Sunday I suppose. The morning was taken up with admin. T was most patient, which was nice. We did more detailed investigation into our proposed trip to Vitoria and decided against it; as the main aim of the trip (to go on the train from Virtoria to Belo Horizonte) would be extremely difficult to achieve. Instead, we decided to go straight to BH (via Rio). After much umming and ahhing about where to stay in BH, we looked at laterooms.com and found that the best hotel in town (according to our guide book) was going for a song. The Internet is a wonderful thing. T is happy.

After a good few hours of admin, we rewarded ourselves with lunch (very late lunch) on the local beach. We had a mixed kebab for two. It was OK. Whilst we were there, the whole beach cleared as it got quite chilly (in Brazil). The restaurant was so busy trying to close that they didn't even bother offering us pudding.

Back to the room for a siesta. T has a new book that she likes. Which means she is worryingly quiet for hours on end. I've even had to do a deal with her so that she'll stop reading for a bit so that we can go out for our tea.

Up bright and early to catch the bus, we had a bit of a rather dodgy breakfast and then got a taxi to the bus stop. After buying our tickets to Rio, we then were chatted to by a nice Brazillian lady who ennumerated her family in Rio at the least provocation.

After a quick stop along the way (where we noted but did not purchase Dulce de Leche) we arived in Rio and went to buy tickets to Belo Horizonte (BH). I waited in one queue whilst T went to another company. She came back to tell me that there were 2 tickets left on the next bus. We did some admirable South American queueing (i.e. We have already spoken to the person behind the counter once - this gives us the automatic right to ignore the queue upon our return) and got the tickets.

May I recommend to you that you don't sit at the back of an Executivo bus, next to the toilet - and next to the chiller (which is pumping out heat) - and on top of the engine, unless you feel like a mobile sauna. Luckily, this was only a 6 1/2 hour bus ride. Never mind - our palacial suite for next to nothing was awaiting in BH.

Perhaps I can digress for a moment, a momentito, if I may.... Reading and interpreting guidebooks is no mean feat. You have to kind of get into the style of the writer to try to read between the lines when interpreting an entry on a town or a hotel or anyhting really. This is complicated by the fact that the guide books have different audiences and styles; so the interpretation has to be modified by the book you read. The whole process is further complicated by the use of multiple authors within a single guidebook. Thus you end up with anomalies. Sometimes something sounds fine and dandy and you toddle off, then wonder what kind of space dust the writer must have been on when they wrote the entry.

Fodors: "The rooftop pool and bar are the best in town"
Lonely Planet: "Don't miss the rooftop bar and pool, one of the best in the city"
Reality: This can be the only rooftop pool and bar - if not, I don't want to see the rest. To be fair, the pool area is nice-ish, if a bit pokey. The bar staff are great, but the food (club sandwich) was inedible. The bar hasn't been redecorated since the Bay City Rollers were number one

Fodors: "Cons: Rooms lack character"
Reality: This is a grossly unfair comment. These rooms ooze character. The problem is that the character that the rooms ooze is Starsky and Hutch circa 1976. Actually, Huggy Bear circa 1976 might be more appropriate.

Of course, it is possible that our bus might actually have been a time machine. Come to think of it - I haven't seen any mobile phones yet. Hmmm.

And it's noisy in our room.

We may not be staying here for Christmas after all. Watch this space.

Buzios

We arrived in Buzios without much of a clue as to where we would be going. People were asking the bus driver to stop here, there and everywhere - we just sat on the bus waiting to be told that we had to get off.

After getting off, after being told to, we stood round waiting for a taxi; the one we got would have been a bit shabby in Bolivia - never mind what is billed as an upmarket resort for the rich and famous. Nevertheless it fulfilled the dual taxi functions of knowing where we wanted to go and getting us there in one piece.

Pousada Hibiscus Bungalow is just by a nice beach (Joao Fernandez) and is a bit of a walk into town. This suits us just fine. Our room is a tad closer to nature than we might like, but it's no Tortugal - where geckos used to pop their heads out of the thatch in the ceiling to see who was staying for the night.

We wandered into town and sat down at a shop overlooking the harbour and ordered our first ciaparinhas of the trip. They were nice, but astoundingly alcoholic. We then decided to ask for a fish, as there was a barbecue lit beside us. We were brought four fish to look at, one was recommended - we chose it. Much faffage ensued as the barbecue was re-kindled and the fish, salad and chips were prepared. It was a most amusing sight. Sated - we returned to the pousada with the aid of a rickety collectivo (to be honest, that's a bit tautological) to sleep the sleep of the just. Again.

Saturday morning and the sun shone. The view is lovely.

View - lovely

We did some admin and then set off, with our washing, into town. After dropping the washing off, we went in search of a way to our next destination.


Washing - tick

It looks like we need to go from Buzios to Cabo Frio to Campos to Vitoria. It will be an adventure

After meeting the oldest woman in Buzios (apart from her mother, who is 99), we toddled off for lunch, eventually settling for the Bar do Ze. We shared a ceviche to start and then, to the accompaniment of a Torrontes (from the vineyard in Mendoza that we had stayed in last year) and Gotan project (French/Argentine tango band we had just been to see in London a few days before departing on our travels) we had a lovely steak (me) and Red Snapper with Banana (T). Fantastico.

We walked back to the pousada for a swim and a brief siesta prior to setting off back into town to collect our clean washing (one of life of the road's little pleasures). We stopped for a drink at a chill-out bar and then headed home as everything seemed to be packing up for the night.

Deciding that walking all that way was a bit thirst-inducing, we decided to stop at a bar beside a square for a drop of refreshment. Where we bumped into Alan, a chap we had been chatting to whilst swimming earlier that day. He convinced us to go and see a Samba band practising in the main square a bit later. We had pizza and went to see the band.


Drummage

This was now 11 pm and there were people of all ages (including a couple of cute toddlers that stole the show) both watching and taking part. It was fantastic. The power of the drumming at that close a distance was quite astounding.

With our ear drums still ringing, we wandered back to bed, saying goodbye to Alan who was off in search of a party. We slept soundly once more.

Busy Buzi Bus

The dying embers of my birthday saw us calibrating our pedometers on Copacabana beach, stopping for a night-cap at a kiosk and then heading for some shut-eye.

We got up late on Thursday and went down to the dungeon for free brekkie. Then we decided to see what the whole H Stern thing was about. Pretty crap really. But it got us to Ipanema, ticked a box and enabled us to buy T the most expensive Havaianas in the world.

We went back to our favourite Rio bookshop for lunch and I bought a book about Buenos Aires (a novel about it actually).

We walked along Ipanema beach in the rain and stopped for a beer. Then we went back to the tourist trap that is the bar that the guys wrote "The Girl from Ipanema" in.

We walked back to Copacabana and I crashed out. For 14 hours.

On Friday we got up to get the bus to Buzios. It was busy. The Busy Buzi Bus.

Friday night was spent on the quayside in Ossos, watching the comedy that was our meal being prepared and the dancing that was the cruise liners manoeuvring in the bay. We got a collectivo home.

Back in Rio - Xmas and New Year 2008/9

 

Rio - damp
So, here I am once more ...
(oops, shouldn't really start quoting Marillion lyrics should I - it'll show how old I am.)

Did I mention it was my birthday?

So, T and I are back in South America. This time for a month. And only in Brazil.
We had a lovely flight time (11:40am) from Heathrow and, after depositing the car in the extortionately expensive car park, arrived in plenty of time to have a Gordon Ramsey breakfast - nice food - appalling service - shocking price, before getting onto the plane and sitting on the tarmac for the best part of an hour.

The entertainment was good enough. Hancock, Ghost Town, Mummy 3 and Trans Siberia. Time passed and we landed.

Arrived at the Marriott (those points do add up) and went straight to bed, pausing only to open my "Happy Birthday Fiance" card (did I mention it was my birthday? - what about the fact that T and I are engaged (which happened 10 months ago)).
Anyway. We awoke to poor weather.

Our spirits were not dampened. After wandering about - failing to get cash - getting a SIM card for the phone and getting wet, we sat at a kiosk on Copacabana beach and had a beer. It's my birthday. We had a beer. On the beach.

T spotted a nice looking restaurant in the guide book and so we toddled off to Porcao. It's a Brazilian BBQ joint. An all you can eat affair. With a cloud enshrouded Sugar Loaf mountain as a backdrop.


T helping to celebrate my birthday - what a trooper

We waddled back for a siesta.

(There's still a bit of my birthday left).

3,577 steps so far today.