Iguazu Falls

As anyone who travels public transport in any country knows only too well, it has a habit of trying up a fair few, lets say, colorful characters (the Cork - Dublin train being a particular magnet for random fruitcakes). Nothing, however, could have prepared us for the freakshow on the 23hr bus from Angra to Foz de Iguazu, via Sao Paulo. It was like a never ending scene from One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, it was bananas, I mean there was a serious want in some of these people, who conveniently enough, all seemed to be seated in our immediate vicinity. Cue, the longest, loudest, most irritating and painful journey of our lives. I dont want to dwell on it too much as the memories will come flooding back. I´ve never seen either of us so close to self destructing. The fact it was a bog standard Semi Cama bus didnt help (we´ve become serious bus snobs, Super Cama all the way since that journey).
The Falls were pretty spectacular in any event, as expected. The first day it was p#ssing rain again so visibilty wasnt great but it was still a great sight. We were on the Brazilain side which gets the far off panoramic view of the Falls. After the first day the two of us began to feel pretty crap and this ended up lasting for almost a week. As a result, we just about made it to the Argentine side the following day and only stayed for a couple of hours. On that side you could literally walk to the edge of all the Falls so you really got to appreciate the sheer force of them. The few nights spent in Foz de Iguazu and Puerto Iguazu didnt happen for us so not much else to report from the 3 days there except that the towns themselves surprised us, because both were such kips. We thought that with a major tourist attraction on the doorstep they´d be nice but no, definitely not. We stayed the extra night of the Argentine side rather than get the hell out of there for one reason and one reason only, to get on a Super Cama bus.

Ihla Grande

On we went from Rio to the tropical island of Ihla Grande. After our great start in Rio, weather especially, we were looking forward to more of the same on Ihla Grande. How wrong we were! It was dull on afternoon arrival there but no fears we thought, the sun will surely be out in the morning and we will check out all these fabulous beaches we ve heard about. That was the best weather we got on the island (bar the morning we were leaving of course when the sun finally came out). It proceeded to empty out of the heavens for the following two days.

Our first night there we quickly realised that our hostel was the party hostel of the island and that most of the people there were Irish and English. Needless to say we fell in a gang of Irish soon enough and it didnt take long before we got carried away altogether. We met a gang of 4 lads from Ennis who were at the end of a 4 month tour of Sth America and a gang of 9 girls from practically every corner of Ireland (7 nurses, a Garda and a Pharmacist). Of course, within 2 minutes of speaking to the Garda from Caherciveen she was talking about the only 2 Gardai from Carrigaline I know, one who is stationed with her in Bray and the other who coached her while he was in charge of the Ladies Football team in Templemore. No names will be put on the public domain but lets just say I heard a few stories about Jose Bale Mourinho which I will be mentioning to him in due course. Anyway, cut a long story short and we were in the horrors the following day which, combined to the bucketing rain, led to serious depression for the day. I mean there aint much to do on a tropical island in the p*ssing rain with an unmerciful hangover. It was a long day but the weather meant that the night in the hostel began early. Another late one ensued but at least we had finished off their stock of Rum the night before so we stuck to the Skol. We had decided that we would leave the following morning if the weather was poor again but we were too lazy and were also excited by the prospect of an all you can eat BBQ that night in the hostel. So we decided to stay and given that it was dry we said we would undertake the two hour hike to Lopes Mendes, apparantly voted worlds best beach in recent years (by who we werent told). We decided to bring the rain jackets just in case. We mustve been hiking steadily uphill through the rainforest a good half hour before we heard our first bit of thunder. An unmerciful thunder storm ensued over the course of the next hour and a half. We had gone too far to turn back and "sure it ll pass soon". It didnt.

We got to the last path before Lopes Mendes, about 20mins away from it when disaster struck and a couple of locals told us the path was flooded after a landslide and it was too dangerous to try it. Now on a scale of nought to gutted, how gutted were we? Very. Soaked to the skin after hiking for hours (and you know we dont do hiking, although we were well impressed with ourselves) and we didnt even get to see what we set out to. Instead, we got lunch on a very strange floating restaurant and waited an hour for a ferry back to our port. Now, what about that all you can eat BBQ I hear you say, well worth the extra night I can assure you. We filled up on a months stock of protein. We also have realised why the Irish and EU farmers are so anti Brazilian Beef, its unbelieveably good and would have then out of business in a flash. Here s hoping the Argentinian steaks are even nicer given their repuation but they ll have their work cut out. Anyway, of course the bloody sun was out as we left the next morning but what can ya do, cant win em all I suppose. Onto the long road to Iguazu Falls we went.

First Port of Call - Rio

We arrived in Rio via Dublin, London and Sao Paulo at 10am on Monday 1st September, having both left home early on Sunday. Thankfully, the trip went very well. The 13hr flight passed by remarkably easily. A few welcome drinks, individual tvs with choice of loads of films, tv shows etc had us excited like a pair of kids. We were met at the airport by a lovely Brazilian lady taxi driver who had not one word of English, which added to our lack of Portugese meant a half an hour of sign language and smiling and laughing all round. How bad, we were happy to get to hostel with such little fuss.

We spent our first couple of days in Rio knocking about Leblon and Ipanema checking the place out. The weather was great so a lot of time spent at the beaches which are pretty class. You could (and we did) spend hours people watching between all the joggers, beach volleyball, beach soccer, men in speedos and women in x-rated thongs! We took one trip over to Copacabana which, to be honest, probably isnt as nice a beach as Leblon or Ipanema and we had heard a lot about the beach and Copa area generally being a lot dodgier also. To be honest, we have had no hassle whatsoever after all the horror stories we had heard, all thats required is a bit of common sense really. We took in the main tourist sites such as Christ Redeemer Statue, cable car to Sugar Loaf mountain etc which were all great. Went to a match in the Maracana with a group of English lads and girl from our hostel. The atmosphere was incredible even though the game itself (Fluimenese .v. Gremio) was a rather tame nil all draw. To be honest, we hardly saw a thing of the first half as we were up behind the goal in the thick of the home support and they sang and waved huge flags the entire time. The match seemed to be a secondary concern to the priority of singing your heart out and having a bit of craic. Anyway, we were loving it after having a few cans of Skol outside the ground. The most controversial moment in the match came with a few minutes to go when Gremio were time wasting and the Fluimenese centre forward gave the goalie an incredibly tame shove, with which the goalie proceeded to perform his best Aidan O Mahony impression and go down like he was shot. The home support obviously went ballistic when the red was shown and we thought we might get a riot! No such luck and the game petered out for the last few minutes.
However, the highlight of our time in Rio had to be the Favella Tour. We had been a bit concerned beforehand at the thought of us tourists paying to go basically look at poor people living in a shanty town, a bit akin to a human zoo. Anyway, we took a tour and as usual there was a giddy atmosphere in the tour van as we took off. This, however, was very shortlived when the guide explained the process to everyone. In particular, he told us to feel free to take photos only that we are under no circumstances to take photos if we see guys carrying machine guns as they are drug dealers and dont want their photos taken! Needless to say there wasnt a peep out of the van for the next few minutes. In Louise's case though the apprehension was more to do with the fact we were told we were to be dropped at the end of the hill up to the Favella and the locals would ferry us up on their scooters. The good news is she survived and loved the thrill of flying up a windy hill dodging in and out of pedestrians, oncoming vehicles etc. Her driver was also very pleased with his luck and openly rubbed it into Shane's driver who was making no effort to hide his disappointment when he drawed the short straw.
The guide advised us that 1 million of Rio s 8 millon people now live in Favellas and that the number of them has increased from 20 in 1960 to 500 in 2000 and now there are approximately 750 Favellas. The one we visited, Favella Rochina, has 200,000 inhabitants and 4 schools. After the talk of machine guns, we were advised that we would be 100% safe up there even with all our valuables. The reason for this is that the mafia/gang who control the Favella see the benefit brought to the community from these tours and have guaranteed the safety of all tourists. What we noticed straight away was that the locals took very little notice of us, some ignored us, some said hello and some were clearly bemused by the sight of stupid looking tourists with their cameras etc. That eased our minds that it may have all been a bit of a charade and all put on for our benefit. We were also pleasantly surprised to see how they had their own self sufficient community there with every type of shop that you d find in any other town rather than what you might imagine with people hanging around the streets with nothing there. We were taken throughout the streets and narrow alleys and saw the abject poverty in the Favella at first hand, open sewers, lots of rubbish, shacks without roofs etc. The guide was very convincing about the benefits brought to the community from the tours (although we knew his spin had to be taken with a pinch of salt). To keep the community and mafia happy, the tour company contributes a proportion of its revenue each month to local projects for building schools, putting roofs on houses etc. We all saw clearly how all the little shops benefit as everyone on the tour would've bought cakes, drinks, some people bought bracelets or paintings and so on, paying downtown Rio prices (which are by no means dirt cheap) but no one minded in the slightest. Of course all the girls in the group were almost in tears when we visited the school and creche at the cuteness of the children.
On a side note, the guide really reminded me of Denzel Washngtons character in Training Day when he was going into the hoods throwing shapes to all the locals. Anyone who has seen it will know what I mean, anyway it kept me mildly amused all morning.

One minus point from the tour was the lack of time he gave to mentioning the social problems in the Favella. Now, obviously its his job to accentuate the positives which is admirable but he barely skirted around the issues very briefly. One thing he did tell us was the the drugs gang turn over $1million USD each month from selling drugs in the Favella. Consider the fact that there are 4 schools for 200,000 residents and one would get the idea of the problems they face very quickly. Anyway, all in all, it was a fascinating morning and one which will stay with both of us for quite some time I would think.

Overall, we absolutely loved Rio. Hostel was great also although a bit quiet the first few nights but we made up for that the last few nights. Locals were friendly without being OTT, didnt really treat you differently good bad or indifferent cos you were a tourist which suited us, no fuss just decent friendly people all round.