Praia, praia and more sand

 

Oi amigos.

After a long time and thousand of kilometres farther a quick life sign from me again.
I already entered in the jungle and arrived in Manaus this morning by boat.But since I coulsn´t write for such a longe time first lets go back to last New Years Eve 2010.

On my last night (29th Dec) in Olinda I got to know two nice guys in my hostal, Matias from Argentina, and Oskar from Mallorca. So on the 30th we left together to Praia da Pipa a Surfer Spot near Natal to spend New Year´s Eve there. Two weeks ago after some days of desperating searching I finally found a hostal there to stay for 4 dyas for 270 Real...about 100Euro in a 8 bed dormitorio. And that was still cheap offer in comparison to what my both new travel mates who had to pay in their hostal 350 Reals. My hostel was a so called Eco Hostal. I was I bit scared what will expect me. Frist I was far outside the city centre, so the guys were a bit concerned of that and accompanied me there. But it arose that it was a really cool place... recent opened it was located within a huge garden with different birds, monkeys and kind of "monkey foxes" - they face looks like a fox but they were climing and swinging from tree to tree like monkeys do ...I never so that kind of animals before. Also the family there and my room mates were really nice.

So on the 31th Dec Matias, Oskar and I rented some bikes to see a bit the coast up from the rocks and watching the "nascer da luna"  - the moon-rise - obviously an important event there. We found a really laid-back bar at an isolated beach (after some kilometres of cross biking over really sandy streets) far away where we were hanging around on a sofa with a chilled coconut.

At night a barbecue was set on in the hostal of the guys, where Matias, as proved barbecue expert, because he´s argentinian, did some steaks and grilled fish. Aside we had Caipi, some chilenean guys brought a kind of Fernet Branca and I tried to introduce to the folk the Spanish national drink - Calimocho (Red wine with Coke)...well, let´s say...the people loved the Caipi ;). As a typical Brazilian tradition we went at midnight all dressed up in white clothes to the beach, counting down to the new year, then stepping 7 times against the waves to have a wish free for the New Year (typical Brazilian tradition) and watched the nice fireworks. The beach were so crowded so we lost us afterwards and after some drinks in the town, we ended up in a small Reggea Bar with live music.

A comment to this picture aside. Based on anthropoligal interest I only sacrificed myself making this foto with them, showing how Brazilian C-models look like ans ans what´s men´s beachwear fashion at moment (so Sebastianm leave you shorts at home, Brazilian women like brown men´s legs)...so no dubious motives behind that if someone with a lot of imagination on a lonely island should think that.

The day after was "tranquilo"...I slept long, did a long walk at the beach later and after a second nap under a palm tree I got some energy back to try some surfing again. Next day I played the first time "frescibol" a kind of Beach-Table tennis. The rackets are like table tennis only bigger and since the sand floor was quite hard so you could make long shots with the ball...it was fun! In the evening we went to watch the sunset and went for a delicious shrimps dinner for our farewell, because Matias and I left next day.

On the 3rd 2 of my kind roommates, Pedro and Wittenberg (yes, that´s his real name) gave Matias and me a free ride to Fortaleza which was little 10hours away. But it was such a cool roadtrip..both knew a lot about Brazil, their hisyoty and culture, and were so free to share their knowledge with us. We had a really nice lunch toghether in a Kilo Restaurant (where yu pay your amount you eat and choose from a free buffet - quiet popular in Brazil) and when we arrived they went with us to a huge Tapioca place - it´s a kind of pancake made from maniok flour in a sweet or savory version, as you prefer. I ate one with dried meat ("carne do sol") which is typical for this region and aside you drink normally coffee for that - perfect combination for me ;) I Love Tapioca!!!

Next morning Matias and I took a bus for a 6 hours ride to Jericoacara, the last hour by jeep crossing a natural park of white sand dunes with blue lagoons to reach this hidden village where you don´t have a post office, nor an ATM. And really it was heaven on earth there. Situated on a beach perfect for wind surfng and kite surfing next to a huge dune where on top the sunset was celebrated every evening with cheering and applause. And really there was s.th. at this sunset I never saw before - you saw single beams in alternate colours. On the trip there we met Darren, a guy from Californiam who took up Oskar´s place.

Since he had a professional camera I was keen that he could make some fotos of me when I tried sandboarding next day on this dune. So he did and surprisingly after the 2nd try a happy croquette  was sliding down the dune without falling. But I have to admit that I only went down 5 times afterwards I was dead running up the dunes again. At night my hostal father gave a samba concert with dinner for us and my flatmate Madleine from Sao Paulo tried to teach me a bit samba aside...in 1month is already Carneval and I don´t feel prepared right now...when I will go to Sao Paulo we want to catch up with the classes again ;).

Next day we made a trip to the "Paradise Lagoon" a blue sweet water lagoon with white sand beaches, palms and hammocks in the water...it was so idyllic, I didn´t want to leave that place anymore ;(. That night I gave my farewell dinner with a typical dish - Fish in Banana Sauce...yummy!






Next day it was time to leave this paradise for me and I made a 2days trip mostly with jeeps through natural parks to Lençois-Maranhense...a park of white sand dunes inany a size of the Netherands with lots of blue lagoons. Since the trip there was quite exhausting and my guide was slobbering over that´s one of the most beautiful places in Brazil you have to see - I was quite dissappointed from what I saw. Given that the rain period haven´t already started, there hardly were any lagoons and those who still existed had little water and only a greenish-brown colour. Not exactly that what I expected to see. Apart from the nice Brazilian people I met in every place and are always open for a chat, the only hightlight at my stay there was culinary....Fish in Maracuja-Sauce this time...also not bad! ;)

After so much natural sites I headed forward to the cities Sao Luis and Belém.

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Pernambuco

Hey everyone...Sorry for starting with spam, you know it´s not my style...but given that I got stuck in the bus station of Recife today for the next 5hours, because it´s the 30th Dec and everyone is leaving the town to passing New Years Eve on the seaside, there is no single place left for me in the autobus to Praia da Pipa.

So, don´t be scared (especially Mathis) that I am so comunicative in the last time, I am really fine, that are only the circumstances ;)...and perhaps I miss you also a bit at these special days so far away from home.

So, my first Christmas far from home in my life I spend in Porto de Galinhas ("Chickenport"). This place got got his strange name from his dodgy history during the period where the slave-dealing got forbidden in Recife by the end of the 19th century, so the smugglers ha to find other ways to get slaves into the country.Therefore they arrived to shore in this village nearby to Recive proclaiming a shipment of "Angolan Chicken". Nowadays Porto de Galinhas is famous for his fine beaches around and therefore changed to a quiet touristic spot. My guide told nme something about hippy place, but I guess like the same fate like the Indians in Brazil they werebanished by the masses of tourists. But none the less the it´s a nice place to relax  & making long walks at the beach and of course for surfing.  Latter one I skipped this time, after 1 month of travelling I had a kind of mini burnout and prefered simply hanging around for christmas.

On the morning of 24th I met Ale, a really sympatic guy from Sao Paulo, and his family at breakfast or better they met me, since I don´t like to eat alone I ask ]ed for a seat at their table ;). We had a nice chat, mentioning my big christmas plans going alone in Churrasceria (it´s a kind of barbecue restaurant where you can eat grilled meat...very typical in the South of Brazil). So, obviously their heart melted and they invited me staying for Christmas with their family. So the wine I bought at the supermarket who was thought to drink at night at the beach alone, I brought around as a little present for dinner. PS.: If you bring a wine around here for an invitation at someone´s places, they call it "chici"...so actually I should ask for the next time what is more common to bring around. So in the evening we went alltogether to a village nearby to the house of the uncle. Here family and friends came together and arrange a christmas buffet in the backyard with chicken and pork roast, codfish-maniok casserole, salads and rice and farofa which you eat for every meal.

Traditionally you start with the christmas dinner at midnight, after wishing everyone (also calling friends far away) the best and give kisses, like we do it for New Years Eve. Teh traditional Christmas desert is Panettone here, but a more elaborated version to his italian origen...freher, with chocolate and orange flavour. Also they served a kind of jelly roll filled with guava marmelade which is a typical sweet for the region Permanbuco. So, I had really luck spending the evening with this people which really were so nice to me. Side note: The father wasn´t a bit worried that I didn´t enjoyed the dinner..given to my german rationality / state of being unemotional (= call me DATA :) ) , it´s not sufficient in Brazil telling one time that you enjoy everything, you need to aver it several times.

Next night I went with Ale and some other people from the hostel to my first Forró party, it´s a music style similar to salsa, but you dance more closely. It´was nice to see it, but after 2-3hrs the music get a bit monotonous given by the same rhythm. Unfortunetly Ale forgot his promising dance past, given by only old dancing partners he has as he said (=só estou brincando), so I looking forward dancing with you again on a rock concert in Sao Paulo ;).

After Christmas I went to Olinda, a beautiful colonial city, with lots of churches and multicoloured houses. There I eattended a "Maracatu" a kind of drum session which they usually do for Carneval. So people went throught the streats playing their drums, followed by  the crowd who danced and drank lots of bear. After that on Sunday night the people got stuck in the streets and places drinking more acohol, eating barbecue and until the last music finished...as usual here in Brazil ;)...."Only today counts, who cares about tomorrow"... this could be Brazilian Mantra.


                 Recife in contrast to Olinda, is huge and modern. Skyscrapers and wides streets mark the city. But surpringly it was not that bad as I thought..there are several nice spots in the center, although the main reason why I came here to visit 2 recommended museums for brasilian art and architecture, which both were closed :(. So I strolled the day through the center, which was a only big market, full of people who sell every useless, cheap stuff you can imagine.
Nowadays quality shops are very rare to find in city centers in Brazil. They moved in huge air-conditioned shopping centers in the suburbs where the middle and upper-class families life and  which are only accessible by car. That´s also a reason why big sities change in a kind of ghost city on Sundays ... the people spend there time at the shopping center or at the beaches ... and you find any soul in the  comercial and busniss district in town. So these days aren´t the savest either to plan sightseeing in town.


So, to close this post it´s only left to wish you all a really nice New Years Eve, have a good part and not too much demanding New Year´s Eve resolution to not get depressed 2 weeks later. I am out of this game this year. In Salvador I got this lucky wristlet at the "Igreja do Bonfim" (= Jesus Church) closed with 3 notes, every single one represents a wish of mine, and I only have to wait patiently (that´s the hard part for me ;) ) until the wristlet will fall of. Daniel from Lençois already weared his one since a year and there is only a fine string left. So, I think the lesson I should learn is to be patient...I got it!!!

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Salvador de Bahia

After 5 days of entire nature I turned back to the other extrem ...city life in the capital of Bahia: Salvador.



Here I did my first Couchsurfing experience in Brazil. Without knowing before, my host Mauricio, studied like me in Ilmenau, and he and his family hosting me so nice - starting from picking me up at he early morning from the bus station, showing me the town and give me a cosy home for 4days. Serving the topics, of course auricio played in a Samba band, where he took me on a Open Bar - Pary the first night where they played. As you can imagine lots of alcohol and samba and dancing.
Next day, Sunday, I went in the brazilian way to the town beach "Ribeira" where many, many people pass their sundays...sitting together in chairs under a sunshade, drinking chilled beer and eating fried fish, grilled shashlik or cheese, o tipical bahian fastfood like Aracaju or Araba, underlined with extrem loud party music by parked cars aside with open trunk and huge boxes which treat with ultrasound the whole area. They doesn´t care the signs every 20mtr on the street...Loud music forbidden. Brazilians get bored at lonely beaches...for them a perfect free day at beach has to be in company and always partying. In the evening I met with Isabel, a spnish girl of my hostel in the Chapada, and we went of one of this incredible lots of concierts which always take place in Salvador. We saw for free a regional rock band, Casca Dura  ...and we enjoyed it pretty much.

Next day Claudio and a friend of him (I got him know on my trekking trip as well) did also a really cool sightseeing tour with me through Salvador. We had lunch at a really cool beach restaurant with view on a light house and at Shrimps in Coconut cream...yummy...and drank Malzbier, they call it "Mausebier" here. But different from Germany it contains alcohol and isn´t that sweet. Lechu, perhaps you like more that version ;).

At night Daniel and Jo, which we also got kow on our trek, arrived as well in Salvador and we celebrate our reunion in a quiet fancy nice live-music bar.

And the last day in Salvador I finished with Mauricio in a quiet nice Modern Art Museum at the seaside, having a ice cafe and watching the sunset, before I took my 15hrs bus to Porto de Galinhas, near Recife, where I spend my Christmas time.

So again, summarising, I survided Salvador...any one robbed me or something else. I felt pretty save and contrariwise the Brazilian are so friendly and hospitable...I love them and we should learn a lot from them being more open to other cutures.

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Chapada Diamantina

 

A big sorry for not writing such a long time in my blog, but strangely I couldn´t enter my blog site for several days.
So first of all, merry, merry christmas to everyone! I hope Santa managed to bring all you wished for down the chimney :). By the way Santa, as you we Germans are really squared, t hat´s why we are also at the top of scientific comunity ;), for Christmas sometimes we also show our funny ratonal side. Afriend of mine send me an article of the University of Tuebingen which made a study of Snta´s pace of work at the holy night. (Tip: paste it in the Google translator in case you don´t speak German):
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Tübingen - Informatik-Studenten der Universität Tübingen haben sich mit dem Arbeitstempo des Weihnachtsmannes beschäftigt und herausgefunden:
An einem einzigen Tag muss er 378 Millionen Kinder beschenken. Damit muss er 822,6 Besuche pro Sekunde absolvieren und: In einer tausendstel Sekunde muss er seinen Schlitten am Dach parken, aus dem Schlitten springen, den Schornstein herunterklettern, die Socken füllen, die übrigen Geschenke unter dem Weihnachtsbaum verteilen, den Schornstein wieder raufklettern und zum nächsten Haus fliegen.

Das ist schneller als das menschliche Auge und erklärt, warum man den Alten nie zu Gesicht kriegt. Ungeklärt blieb, wie er auf seinen Schlitten das Gewicht von errechneten 378 000 Tonnen Geschenken packt und wie er die von der Stelle kriegt. Wir schätzen, dass der Weihnachtsmann dafür etwa zweitausendfünfhundert Gabelstapler und ein Gespann mit etwa 150 000 Rentieren bewegt.

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So back to work...My tough life as a Backpacker. What hppends at last.

From the 13th - 17th December I spent 5days in the Chapada Diamantina, a natural park in the west of Salvador the Bahia...an enourmous tableland (bigger than the Netherlands) with full of deep valley and rivers and waterfalls -a paradise for trekking. So I did as well. I joined a 3days trek with a brazilian guy from my hostel , Jadiel, and or guide Flor aiming to see the Cachoeira da Fumaça, Brazil´s 2nd higgest waterfall with nearly 400m after the one they found some years ago in the Amazonas. A stream is tumbling down over the mesa and becomes a fine mist before touching the gound of the deep valley.

Per day we walked around 12km, sounds not much, but the sun and ups and downs between peaks and valley were pretty exhausting, especially for my knees givn that everyone also carry a rucksack of 6-7kg.


During the walk our guide shows us los of plants and animals...like cobra, a colibri and we also get neary in direct contact with the wild wasps at the last day. We nearly reached the top of the waterfalls the lst day, I was running out of energy, but the wasps made me running like Ben Johnson on dope.

At night we met with other groups at the riverside & spend the night under the stars with a deserved Caipi. By the way, pretty interesting facts for all alcoholics...Cachaca, which they use for Caipis, costs less than pure water...you can buy a liter of homebrewed one for 2Reals (less than 1 Euro).


But be careful: Please drinks lots of water before going to bed after a Caipi night, not like me who woke up in the total darkness several times at night to drink water ouf the river there.


Flor, our guide, had a really interesting history, he worked 5 years as a diamant seeker in the Chapada, a extrem physical job before becoming a guide, which he does since 9 years. His back is actually half "kaputt" and hurts but forced to survive it´s not unsual in the hig season that he´s out on track for entire 20days walking with his flip-flops through the mountains while caring heavy bag. In memory as his diamond seeker times he made us a gorgeous "Diamond coffee" at 6 a.m. in the morning, putting river water and coffee powder in a pot and stiring it with a annealing limb from the fire...really delicious! Flor also played the double for the movie of Besouro - a capoeira legend from Bahia - by jumping down a 30mtr rock. The movie will be realeased next year in Europe - watch the trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9wczI20kz4

Finally we finished the trek without any serious injuries (okay, one night the mosquitos attacked obviously only my face, that I got offered next morning "antihistamine" - since I hadn´t seen my face since 2 days, no idea how scary I looked like :), but later at home, statistically the most dangerous place to stay, it happened. At midnight the automatic light of the toilet switched off, so I searched the light switch in the total darkness. But before I found the aforementioned I bumped with my eyebrown against a towl holder which hurt a bit. I went back to the toilet and afterwards to the think to wash my hands. Apalled I saw my face blood flooded. Shit...I was tired and only wanted to sleep. It didn´t hurt much, but in my bad luck I bumped myself very precise so I got a small laceration. Fortunately my former collegues prensented me a quiet complete first aid kit, so I could help myself.

But, next stop is the city Salvador...a bit scared going there...because everyone made me so afraid beforehand, telling me lots of stories and that´s is much more dangerous than Rio...So finger´s crossed that I will survive :)!!

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South of Bahia

Annoyed from to much rain I turned the state Minas Gerais my back and made a "quick" bus ride of only 18 hours to Porto Seguro in the Bahia. As every "gringo" (= foreigner) I fell into the same trap like already in Spain 2 years ago. First of all an oldery guy in the bus getting on my nerves since he always looked at me and starting a consversation with me. But me with my sleep sickness was to tired to be friendly at all. I only want that everyone let me in peace. Later, I was really in a deep sleep, his guy waked me up at 11 p.m. only to offer me some potato chips and I got pretty grumpy with him. But well, one time everyone needs a toilet, my time was about 3a.m. at night where everyone was sleeping in the bus and felt that I was the only one who left the bus. Coming back from the toilet in this gas station in the middle of nowhere, how else should it be be, my bus ran away in front of my eyes with all my stuff in there...I was running behind it shouting to wait, but no chance! But coming back to the station desperately, suddenly the the potato chips guy stand next to me, telling me the bus will come back in some minutes and I was sooo pleased to him this time.

So, after 14hrs sleep and 2hours Spanish music lessons on my mp3-player (longer the battery doesn´t last) and further 2 hourse nature watching I arrived in Porto Seguro  - the place where Brazilians history officially started on the 23.4.1500 when Pedro Alvares Cabral under Portuguese flag discovered Brazil. Actually it was only a 10days stop there to get fresh water, food etc. to move on to India where at this time fabulous wealth could be gained. Regarding this obvious lack of interest of Cabral in their beautiful country, the Brazilians didn´t name any  place, street, monument or anything else named after him. So Porto Seguro, nowadays, is a famous holiday resort with palm fringed beaches and a quiet animated nightlife. Since I was totally alone on my hostel I can´t tel you a lot about the later one :(. My only social contact where I nice Brazilian family I met on the beach with 5 children and I hung up with there 3 young girls around 13-14yrs old who taught me some portuguese and gave me some Brazilian music lesions. So cute, they asked me where I would spent Christmas and they invited me in there house if I would like only knowing me for a couple of hours - extremly hospitable the people here. Well the only dark side or let´s better say red side of  this nice day at the beach with them was that I totally forgot my poor white European skin between my tanned Brazilian family which turned out in   I got a incredibly sunburn on my back. always good when you have to where a heavy rucksack on that :)...AUUUAA!! After the pain was over was a living potato in the skin.

So after 2 days I move forward north another 8hrs by bus to Itacaré. My guide only  left 7 lines for this beautiful place mentioning anything about surf. In reality it´s the heaven on earth for surfers and hippies there - a tiny village, the hostel woman talked something about some crack problems, with lots of bars and the coolest beaches I saw so far...and finally lots of other backpackers here.

So the next 5 days were totally the contradiction to my lifestyle before - leisure time stress because I spend nearly whole the time with other people likewise my 29th birthday where I also present myself my first surf lesions...actually I only rented the board..as I told the life guard at the beach he should watch out for me because I am a very beginner, he couldn´t stand more than 5min watching me falling in the water again and again...so he sacrificed himself to help me =)..and I really progressed the next days there.

The cool thing at this tiny places like Itacaré, later also in Morro de Sao Paulo and Lençois - you get pretty quick integrated in the community there. After 2-3 days meet already shake a lot of hands while only make a small walk through the streets which on the other hand side makes it more difficult to leave such a pleasant and homey atmosphere. At the end the only things which separated me from being a native from there were some rastas and some tattoos. Really here at the seaside nearly everyone is very tattoos - huge tattoos. Perhaps I make my secret rainbow turtle tattoo dream on my ass true here :). And the dark side of Itacaré were the Mosquitoes at night...If I wouldn´t have had the cool "Biteaway tool" which kills the itchiness I would have died. So I couldn´t consider my room mates at night who had to bear a continuous "beep" at night, always when I used this wonderful tool...Sebastian, thanks again for this useful present!!

To get a rest from so much sport I left after 5 days to Morro de Sao Paulo, a nice town the island Tabaré. also here gorgeous unspoiled beaches, but more a kind of hip atmosphere with trendy bars at the beach.

Here the "world is a village"-effect occurred. In the hostel I net a girl who worked together with the girl where I stayed in Rio. We spend some really nice 3 days together hanging at the beach, seeing little Arielle fishes in the water (you remember the fish Florian, her friend? - this kind of fishes) and we tried out horse riding - my childhood anti-dream after spending a week horse riding holidays with 12years. I was always afraid to fall down if the horse will canter. But I have to admit I was one of the coolest thing I did until now gallop on the horse along an empty beach, the wind in your hair, awesome! The only dark side this time was that the agency guy where we booked this activity tried to frame us. Instead of 25Reals for 2 hours afterwards he told it was 25Real per hour. So Susann and I argued with the guy in Portuguese for 15min telling him we won´t pay it, because it was his fault telling us wrong until he backed down. Our hostel lady telling us how crazy we are arguing in front of 4 guys but we survived the island. The nightlife wasn´t bad as well, an Axé Party (= Brazilian music style) at the beach with lots of caipi stand mixed with every fruit flavour you like...yummy!

..and also watching the sunset from a really chilly place on top of a mountain there was a highlight. We lied on some pillows, again with a caipi in a hand, watching the sun go down and hearing laid~back Brazilian music a girl played from the back with her guitar.

But so beautiful beach and sun are, after 1,5 weeks I need a change again...so back to the mountains for some days. Next stop: Lençois in the Chapada Diamantina - looking forward for some trekking in a natural park in Bahia.

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Minas Gerais

Boa dia, gente! Como vai?

Let´s summaries my last week - I spent my time in the state Minas Gerais . It´s situated above Rio ... a place which famous for it has a "breast of iron and a heart of gold"...at least in the 17th century when rich mineral deposits where found in this area incl. lots of diamonds and gold. Today the real diamond of Minas Gerais are there beautiful colonia-era towns and its  vast rural area with plenty of natural parques.

Since Brazil is a quite huge country, let´s say 8,5 million km², so there are many things to visit, I spent in total 5 day to sdiscover at least some bits. Thursday night my autobus left Rio de Janeiro to bring me only within 8 hours to the the most famous colonial city Ouro Preto ( = the black gold). Thanks to my sleeping sickness someone waked me up in the early morning when we reach the bus station there. At 7 a.m. and something I reached my small hostal which were recommend by the people of Rio and they welcomed me t here with a nice breakfast on a terrace with a splendid view over Ouro Preto. For breakfast you normally get papaya, bananas , cake and rolls with butter, cheese and ham. And of course coffee with a huge a twice as big sugar bowl aside...because as I observed on the streets the Brazilian are used to fill up the half of there coffe  cup with sugar...Iiiigs!!! By the way I couldn´t believe it that caipirinha is made with white sugar as I already taasted it in Spain, but unfortunately it´s true.

Actually Ouro Preto is a quiet and small town when you screen out those buses from the surrounding which come every moring spilling out their tourists and pick them up in the evening again...after that it´s get quiet again. So I started in this sunny day, walking up and down this hilly place and enjoyed visiting some of lots of churches which are situated there. After this daily stress of Rio it was a nice welcome change. You could see many old housed in different colours based within a very green valley. In the afternoon I realized why it´s so green since it started to rain until night. So first ocacsion to use my super reddish rain coat, sponserded by mon, thanks for that - it passed the test and also the others in the following days ;). Since there were less people in the hostel the manager of this played obviously wad bored as well and invited me for a typical brazilian dinner...farofa with raisins, Cabbage ans other green leaves he found in the nature, rice and feijoada which I actually didn´touch since I found out that it contains  pig´s excrements..let´s say there feet, ears, etc.....yummy! Completed were the dinner by Cachaça, of course, and SKOL - a famous beer brand in Brazil...and I have to admit I liked it. It´s a quite light beer, very cold and refreshing. Since a feijoada needs his time to get ready, meanwhile my host Daniel gave me my first lesson in brasilian independent music and played some jazzy songs on his guitar. Unfortunately I can´t show you any picture of this Ouro Preto since mysteriously my camera deleated all :(....Vaya mierda!!! (=Kotz!)

Next day, new destinatio...O Santuário do Caraça...it´s a beautiful monatery situade within a protected Natural Park where no bus goes to- so only option for me was to  take taxi to this place. But it was worth. You get a simple room in this monastery and can make sveral tracks to different waterfalls and caves. After the daily  tourist leave the place you eat together with the remaining guest together in a kind of old refectory. The brazilian like buffet...so they can eat as much as they want. And they are much worse in mixing up different food as we Germans are. So rice with pasta and chips is a legitime combination here.

But after dinner the actual highlight of the day arises - everyone is moving to the veranda of the backyard and is waitind excited on the wolves who live in this area. It´s a long-stand tradition of the monks leaving food for them near the church. And as brother Markus told me they come nearly every night. So in a pleasant anticipation we waited more than an hour...but bad luck for me I didn´t see any wolf - the only animal contact I had this night was with a salamander who softly touched my skin of my back while I was sitting on a stone. But at least I took a picture (see on the top) of a wolf in the meseum to show us as it would have been :(. Since I was the only foreigner in this monastery I quickly socialized with the people there and Fatima, the girl from the museum, told me a trick (= um jeithino brasileiro) how to avoid to take a taxi back to town since I am travelling on loe budget. So I enqueued myself the next day for the bus for employees and Fatima also arranged a friend who got in the bus later to acconpany me to the right busstation on a street cross really in the middle of nowhere.
But surprisingly short time later I bus passed by on this empty route which brought me in 2 hours to Belo Horizonte, the capital of Minas Gerais.

Well , what´s to so say about Belo Horinzonte? Well, I didn´t see the horizont at all the  next 2 days since it was raining the main part of the day. After Sao Paulo and Rio it should be a quite important economical centre of Brazil and quite young city as well. Established in the early 1890s it grew quickly from 1945 vwith 100.000 inhabityants to 2 millions now. It´s one of the first planned cities in brazil wehich you can recognized in his parallel ordered streets who are namen cronologically after states, regions and capitals of Brazil.

So there are skyscrapers and modern houses, n-frills. The hostel at least was quite cute with a own swimminfg pool and my private dorm. I met there an australien guy with his really anoying little daughter (I don´t know she was 5yrs or something, thought I am from Kitzbuehl, of course she hated people from Kitzbuehl like me and she supected me I am at loggerheads with his dad). His dad also a bit strange or let´s say adventureous.He wants to settle his life in Brazil...principally nothing to say against that. But, without having a specific plan where and much more worse withou speaking any portuguese. Thank god I did a portuguese course before because without you are nearly lost...nearly no one spewaks proper English;;and as an Engineer at least I would figure out before where are good palces to work and make some helpful contacs beforehand. But could also be that I am still to german...freaky Austrians...my respect!

But there were also pleasant people in the hostel like Rodriguez , a becoming dentist who had is final exam in Belo Horinzonte and wrote his tesis about who dentist could help to diagnose depressive labour. And thanks to my previous "How knows nice people in Brazil" - campaign I had the luck to get to know Guilherme. A really sympathic and esay going guy. We spend a really nice evening togehter with pizza and caipi and he told me a lot of interesting and funny stuff about brazilian culture and german feminists ;). So please help yourself if you come to visit me one day.

And so my days in Minas Gerais finished...I took on tuesday evening the next bus to Porto Seguro in the state Bahia...a quick 18hrs ride in numbers 1000km back to the seaside.

So I leave you here...Boa noite gente! 

Com os melhores cumprimentos, Vicci =)

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