Brazil
So when my awesome incredible friend took a bus to the airport to go back to the real world, I took a bus up across the border to Porto Alegre, Brazil. I stayed with a friend I had met in Spain when I studied abroad. I didn't think I would ever see her again, and then I was passing through her home town. Neat! We went to a Churrascaria, known outside of Brazil as a "Brazilian Steakhouse" where they walk around carving meat off a giant shish kebab until you push them away from your table. Much more affordable where it was invented. She also showed me the Southern Brazilian style of mate (MAH-tay) which is bright green, has sticks in it, and is served out of a gourd with a much wider neck. Still great though.
In front of the shoo-HAS-ka-ree-ya (See mom, I must not smell that bad)
The next day I continued up the coast of Brazil (that country is huuuge) to Florianopolis, then inwards towards the tiny town of Alfredo Wagner, where I met my new hosts, Ryan and Fabiana. From there it was still 45 minutes of driving on dirt roads into the heart of the landscape until we arrived at their cabanas, but man was it worth it! They have a ridiculously incredible view of the locally famous, creatively named mountain: "Pedra Branca" ("white rock").
The View (Approximately the position of the hippopotami in the opening of The Lion King)
Ryan and Fabiana are both mining engineers, and after only a few years of working with one of the most lucrative majors in the world they left and bought the last plot of land on the road to Pedra Branca, built a couple of cabins and will proceed to rent them out to tourists, essentially fulfilling a retirement dream at the tender ages of 28 and 30. Mind you, they just finished building and haven't gotten a customer yet, and while I was there, Fabiana left for a 6 month consulting gig in Peru to help fund their dream, so paradise is a little complicated, but still, to wake up to this:
Beautiful view (#NoFilter)
They have really awesome neighbors, Francisco and Nelita, who they bought the land from. We helped them do some weeding of their mountains and Seu França, as he is known, would frequently declare breaks for caiparinhas (a Brazilian tequila drink), and Donna Lita, as she is usually called, would make fresh bread, cake, her milk, cream, butter and cheese, a special jam, three types of yucca, and some amazing beef thing that used to be their cow for lunch. We didn't mind helping them out.
Seu França and Donna Lita (Of course he built that with his bare/bear hands)
One day they asked if we wanted to climb Pedra Branca, the huge right-there-in-your-face table mountain we had been staring at for weeks. Obviously, we dropped everything and left.
A break during the hike (They even remembered cups for us poor idiots. And yes, Fabiana's half Japanese)
Incredible views all the way up for the entire 4 hours it took. When we finally got to the top, the view was incredible. As expected, from the cliff the cabins were not right-there-in-your-face, although we did eventually find them.
Ryan could see his little houses (And how insignificant we all are in the world)
Then Seu França proved his level of wizardry by plucking a rather large weed and throwing it off the cliff. We watched it go over the edge, which is not all that remarkable, but were quite delighted when it came shooting back up perhaps 20 feet over our heads and landed safely approximately where it was idly growing before. After carefully peering over to make sure this was not a carefully timed joke with his dear Donna Lita on a lower ledge, we cautiously, then enthusiastically began tearing up every plant we could find to whirl about in the sky for us in an anti-gravity chute.
The wind tunnel (It does not, as may appear, come roaring from the skies to smite the grossly overpaid Excel monkeys)
Of course the real explanation is much less interesting: as the wind hits the cliff and certainly can't go down, it shoots up this ramp and is funneled quite strongly into a narrow path that can't be seen, or indeed felt. Unless of course, you stick your head into its currents...
Effects on my hair
On the way back down Seu França stuck out his hand and hushed us, and a moment later we saw the branches of the tree right in front of him move in a very suspicious manner. We managed to catch glimpses of a dark blob leaping rather irresponsibly from branch to branch, and in a moment it was gone. We raced down the path, which at this point was switchbacking rather steeply, and just as we lost hope of seeing him again, we came to a corner where a tree had fallen and we could look out on a large section of forrest. There in the trees we found two whole troops (or barrels?) of different species of monkey, one of which Seu França had never even seen before. We watched in surreal awe as they nimbly jumped from branch to branch (never climbing down from the tree tops) and stared back at us in a very bizarrely human way.
Whoa! (That embarrassing "Oh yeah, that was when I was traveling" photo)
Other adventures include climbing a tree with Ryan, the amateur rock climber:
Tree climbing (In retrospect this was probably not worth the danger)
Nothing really holds a candle to the day we climbed the mountain and saw the monkeys, so maybe I'll stop. I did do real work too though. I planted a lot of onions and carrots and radishes, made a natural rock water filter, finally watched the fourth season of Game of Thrones with them, and (as is becoming customary) fixed some of their electricity.
Of course, this was all from July 20 - August 20, and you may know that we are approaching the end of September. After I left the wild outback of Brazil, I landed on a Belgian tree-house resort in Argentina. Since by now I have also said goodbye to them and am now riding horses through rivers in the Dominican Republic, the only delay between this adventure you are receiving now and the next will be the time I need to sort my thoughts on the subject. I didn't want to keep you unduly waiting for a double combo story, which nobody would have the patience to read anyways, so enjoy this as it is and expect another in a few short days!
Obrigado e Boa Noite,
Colin