Sao Paulo is the third largest city in the world; a huge metropolis of about 17 million people that isn't particularly touristy but we found a few things to keep us entertained. To get the scale of the city we decided to go up the Santander Tower, a huge skyscraper that had a viewing platform giving a 360º view from the top. We'd heard of a few streets in the Pinheiros area that are frequented street artists and decided to go and take a look. We got lost and wandered in circles for a while until spotting a few pieces of graffiti that led us into the colourful streets where all the walls had been painted with large murals by lots of different artists.
We walked around the city a lot and saw lots of local life; from the plaza outside the cathedral that was filled with beggars and the homeless to huge groups of football fans as they chanted their way through the city and could be heard for miles around. After visiting a couple of local supermarkets we quickly realised the quality and variety of produce in Brazil was of a much higher quality than in Argentina and Chile, that we wouldn't have to choose between the shrivelled tomato and the one that was growing mold anymore! We took a day to head out to see the municipal market which is supposed to be one of the best in the country and the areas around where lots of street sellers peddled their goods. We eventually found the market after strolling down and around the general area for about half an hour. Along the way we saw millions of illegal traders sprinting down the roads with carts and bags then hiding in alleys while the police leisurely strolled behind confiscating anyone's stock who was too slow. In the markets we found lots of colourful and amazingly displayed stalls selling anything from tropical fruits and veg to salted meats and pickled things in jars.
Our aim was to try a few of the tropical fruits that Brazil is famed for. We headed to a busy looking stall and got chatting (mostly gesturing) with one of the workers. We told him how much money we had to spend and he set to work offering us various tasters and making "mmmmMMMMMmmmmm"'s and other creepily seductive noises as we tried the fruit. We eventually whittled down our selection to a few fruits and while he was wrapping them he decided he liked our pen he had been using to cost everything and so traded it for a mango, then while no one was looking he slipped in another couple of fruits. We said our goodbyes, consisting of learning new handshakes and high-fives, and headed off back to the hostel for a tasting session of our own. We came away with: 1 custard/sugar apple, 1 mango, 1 cashew apple, 1 chocolate pudding fruit, 1 tree tomato and a couple of anonymous green fruits that tasted like apple.
Next we were heading off to Rio de Janeiro on a nice, short 6 hour bus. We arrived after dark to a very confusing bus terminal and no obvious way of getting to the subway system other than a taxi and yet again Lonely Planet was of no use! After searching around and looking suitably lost for a while someone came to our rescue and told us that there is a shuttle bus that connects the bus station with the subway that only costs a few Reais (sort of pronounced "real" but not really, very confusing, we never got the hang of it!) After a few more lovely people offered us their help with getting to and on the subway on the right line we managed to make our way to our hostel in Copacabana (Walk on the Beach) and crashed out in a 9 bed dorm, three beds stacked on top of one another. With only two top beds left we eventually managed to climb up and slept until morning.
The next day we took in the sights of the city as we strolled to the beach and lazed about in the sun. The following day we took in the same sights of the city as we strolled to the beach... it became quite recurring and we eventually decided we needed to see more of the city and, as the day was cloudy, we strolled around to the part of town next to Ipanema beach. We watched the sun set while sat atop a big rock formation over looking the beach and caught a glimpse of Christ the Redeemer (the "big man on the hill") in the distance. We strolled back to Copacabana and sat on the beach front sipping fresh coconuts with rum and watched the sky fade to black.
We had booked a flight with Gol to Manaus, a city on the Amazon river, and with one day left in Rio we decided we had better make an effort to go and see the city's main attraction, but first we would spend a couple of hours on the beach. It's a hard life. We got directions and caught the bus to Christ the Redeemer just in time for sunset. We caught a tram up the mountain that circles the statue and gives amazing views over the city. It arrived at the top while the sun was still up and the skies were clear so we took the obligatory arms spread wide photos while stood in front of the statue and smiled at the details (he had toes sticking out the bottom of his robe - this makes me happy). Clouds began to roll in as the sun was dropping and the temperature plummeted as we shivered in shorts and t-shirts. As the Christ disappeared into the clouds we made a quick retreat back down the mountain and to warmer ground.
We stepped out of the air conditioned airport in Manaus to a wall of heat and humidity and a quick tropical downpour after spending the night in Rio airport (our flight was at 5am.) We hadn't slept but had no time to rest as we had heard there was a boat leaving to go up the Amazon the next day (the next one after wasn't for another 5 days) to a town called Tabatinga where we could cross the border into Colombia. We went to a hostel we had heard about called Hostel Manaus and asked to use their facilities (e.g. shower and laundry etc.) despite not wanting spending the night. We thought we were in for an afternoon of running around ticket hunting but we got speaking to a couple, called Ian and Sinead, who were already booked on to the boat and had spent 4 or 5 days already just searching for the cheapest tickets. They had found out that Hostel Manaus offered the best priced tickets and so we decided to save ourselves the hassle and booked through them. We had planned to book a cabin but the only ones left were the luxury ones that were way out of our budget so we decided to get a couple of hammocks and string them up with everyone elses. We were feeling slightly more bold about the matter since we'd just met two more "gringos" who would also be doing it. We headed into town to find a cash machine to pay for the tickets and to pick up essentials such as water, crackers and nutella for the five day journey up the river to make the meals a little more interesting (we had been warned they were a little bland and repetitive.) We met the man we were buying the tickets off and he organised a taxi to take us to the boat and swung by a street stall on the way to buy our hammocks and rope to string them up. A quick water taxi later and we were on board the boat and trying to set up our hammock in a cosy corner out of the way.
We had decided to spend the night before the boat departed sleeping on board as this saved us another nights accomodation and meant we got to start the "adventure" a little earlier. The night went well and we were surprisingly comfortable until about 3am when a big storm started and we all froze due to the open sides of the boat until we figured out how to drop the tarpaulin to block out the wind. The next day the boat began to fill up and we would soon be on our way...
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