When we arrived in Sao Paulo half of our luggage got behind in Amsterdam. Via the KLM we booked a hotel room near to the airport and stayed for three days. Yeb got this terrible cold already in Madrid and he still didn't feel well, but after three days he definitely wanted to hit the road again. We got so many warnings of several people concerning the unsafety of Sao Paulo-city that we avoid it and cycled around it and via Moji du cruzes we ended up in Bertioga at the coast.
Yeb felt even more ill and we hired a cabin and stayed another few days. It was nice to live in a real house again with our own kitchen. But you can't be sick forever off course so after some days it was time to say goodbye to all the nice people we met. We cycled for days along the coast on beautiful nice white beaches, and enjoyed the exotic atmosphere and the extraordinary friendly Brazilian people. After Periuibe ,Yeb got these high fevers and he reacted very bad on penicillin he took so we got stuck again (this time for a week) in a village called Pedro de Toledo.
The people from the hotel were so helpful and the Brazilians really have stolen our heart. I think they are the most helpful people in the world. We experienced that everywhere we stayed. Fantastic!!!!! Let me give an example;
One day we cycled over an island called Ihla de Comprida and we went just too far for the turn to the ferry. But we didn't feel like going back and thought that there must be another way to the ferry. We found a little track through the jungle but after a while it didn't look hopeful anymore to us and got lost in a way. But we entered a open space with a wooden house and hammocks, and the owner just turned back from fishing. He explained we couldn't go on further we had to follow him to his little boat at the beach and before we even realised he and some mates put our bikes in the boat between some fresh fish and we had to jump in as well. A trip to the shore where we could continue the track to the ferry. Brilliant
Well, these things happened like all the time in exotic Brazil.Curitiba, 28th July 2002 The trip from Cananeia to Ariri was quit a big adventure. We first had to take a ferry again (Yeah, you have a lot of ferries in Brazil and for cyclists they are all for free). The road to Ariri wasn't paved but it didn't look too bad to us. But the more we got into the jungle the more this road turned into a muddy track. Eventually we stood with our ankles in the mud, and we pushed our bikes through it. But in spite of these difficulties we thought this was great and we got a real expedition feeling. After 70 km we arrived tired but very satisfied in Ariri. A little village which seems to be at the end of the world. Amazing how people can live here. Everybody looked at us but we found a nice friendly "hospedaje" with very nice people who cooked for us the most delicious meal with fries salad and fresh fish.
The next day we headed of to the harbour. Everybody told us there would be always someone who would like to take us to another island. And we were lucky I guess.
A young man approached us and asked us where we wanted to go. He had a new boat and apparently he could use the money, so after some negotiating he decided to take us to Paranagua. A daytrip more or less. It was beautiful!It was already dark when we got there and it was hard to find us a place to stay because there was some kind of motorparty in town so every single hotel was fully booked. But we were lucky again. One of the hotel owners offered us a very tiny room with one bed and a mattress on the floor. Excellent..
The next day we left for Curitiba. We didn't check our map so we didn't know it was about 1000 meter higher than Paranagua. It was a while ago we climbed so much. But we made it and took a day off in Curitiba. Time to do some laundry.........
Foz de Iguacu, 3th august 2002
Our trip from Curitiba to Foz turned out to be different then expected. The first day we cycled a 115 km to Ponta Grossa.. We arrived in the dark which is not very pleasant so we "dived" into the first hotel we saw. Well, there are these days you get all the bad luck. Next day was a day like that. After a wrong turn, a flat tyre and lots of rain we ended up at the other side of Ponta Grossa and decided to take a cheap hotel and to wait for some better weather. The next day it was still pissing down and the weather forecast didn't sound very hopeful. So what about a little bustrip?We did and the next day we arrived in Foz de Iguazu, found a youth hostel and enjoyed the best pizza?' and buffets in Brazil!!!
.We visited the Fall's (the biggest waterfalls in South America and incredible impressive), Yeb went for a haircut and we looked forward to hit the road again to Paraguay!
