Carnival time

On Friday 16th February the keys of Rio de Janiero were given from the mayor to King Momo (king of the Carnival) and the Carnival was officially open. All the locals have a long weekend off work and the drinking began. The streets were full of vendors selling food and lots and lots of alcohol - mainly cans of Skol, but if you searched long enough you could also find the occassional can of Stella. For most residents of Rio, Carnival simply means getting a bank holiday and drinking on the streets. Very few get to see the floats and costumes as all parades go on within the Sambodrome.
The sambodrome is very similar to a giant runway with concrete stands on either side. The samba school compete here to win the title of best school. Each scool is allowed 90 mins to proceed from one end of the runway to the finishing line. Within this time they can send down as many floats or people as they wish. All the time they are being judged by a team of 40 judges sat along the runway. They are being judged on dancing, samba intrepretation, musical direction etc. As they are making their way down, a band and a singer usually towards the back of the procession are performing the song that has been specially written for that school for that year. This song is repeated for the entire 90 mins. As you can imagine at times this does get a little repetitive! On Sunday night I was seated towards the end of the Sambodrome watching the first 6 schools compete. The floats are so impressive - they are huge - you could hide an entire army within one. Some of them had obvious themes, wonders of the world, animals of Africa, Ancient Greece, Mayan Civilisations etc but some of them were down right bizarre. One was a giant lime green brain that every now and again fired glitter into the air! Most schools seemed to have around 7 floats each and alot of dancers. One school had over 5000 people in the parade. I was watching a sea of colour - they were so many dancers you could not make them out individually. One bonus of being sat near the finishing line was that I got to watch the floats exit the stadium. This was no easy task. It required a team effort. First the dancers at the top of these floats had to be lifted out by giant cranes. These cranes then had to dismantle the top sections of the floats and lift them over the walls - the rest of the float could then be pushed through the gates. Some of the schools with lots of floats created their own problems as the early floats could not be dismantled quickly enough before the rest of the floats caught up and created bottlenecks - you ended up with lots of dancers stuck with nowhere to go unable to cross the finishing line. If anything, person or float was not over the line after 90 mins the school got penalty points. As the night progressed the atmosphere within the Sambodrome got more and more electric - dancing and singing in the aisles was the norm - nobody was sat down to watch. Our group only lasted till half 3 - the parades continued on till 6am.
The sambadrome had schools competing on Monday night as well with the final results not announced till Wednesday - it takes that long to count them. I spent the rest of Carnival weekend drinking alot of Caprihinis and generally recovering. Oh, one thing they never mention on the telly about Carnival is the smell. Everyone is drinking on the streets - but there are no toilets so the street literally becomes an open sewer. Its not cleaned until the following Wednesday, 5 days later and what with the heat (at least mid 30´s every day) it is extremely unpleasant. One of my strongest memories of carnival will not be the costumes, the shootings on the way home from Sambadrome (tell you about that later) but the stench of the city. Such a shame because the costumes and the floats were amazing!

Final Destination ~ Rio

The final stop before Rio was the little cobbled stoned village of Paraty, home to a number of beaches. I took a boat trip along the coast, visiting more tropical looking beaches and diving into the crystal blue water. It sounds idyllic and under normal circumstances would be. Paraty were preparing for their own carnival but not only that but as Paraty is just a stones throw away from Rio all the other overland trucks who were going to Rio for Carnival arrived here on the same day. Thats 23 trucks all with around 25 people on them crammed into a couple of tiny campsites. The place was heaving, everyone was in a party spirit and sleep was simply impossible! So on Thursday 15th Feb (at half 5 am - to try and get a head start on the other trucks) will left Paraty for the final 5 hour stretch to Rio.

Rio is a huge city, home to 12 million people. Our hotel (air conditioned - bliss) is located in the Lapa district - not too far from the Sambadrome (that may be handy later). Obviously you cannot come to Rio without visiting the Big Man, so transport was arranged and I paid a visit to Cristo Redentor and was rewarded with amazing views over the city. J.C was not as big as I was expecting, given that you can see him all over the city - he is about the same size as the Angel of the North. I then went out to the other famous attraction Sugar Loaf mountain. There is no other way to reach the summit than to take 2 seperate cable cars. (Mum you would never have got up). Again the views were spectacular and I was so lucky that there were no clouds in the sky to detract from either view. Normally the top of both Christ and SugarLoaf are hidden in cloud. As well as seeing the sights I have also taken in the local culture. I have been drinking copious amouts of Caphrihini´s and Caprioska´s (the national drink made with sugar cane rum, limes and sugar), I have also embraced the national passtime of football. Brazilians can certainly play football so I went to watch a local match at the Maracana stadium (once the biggest stadium in the world seating over 200,000 people). The crowds were very passionate and as for the game itself - I have never sen as many goals being scored. The final score was 4-4 and the Vasco supporters whose stand I was sitting in were very happy with that!

My truck tour is now officially over - although we are all staying on in Rio for a while yet - apparently there is a party happening in the next couple of days. Decided to celebrate in style - managed to find an activity I haven´t yet experienced. I ran off a very high cliff face. It was extremely nerve racking but the tandem hang glider I was attached to didn´t crash to the ground but floated silently over the city landscape and the beach. A relaxing and serene experience ~not going to get any more of those in the next few days!

Mutant Killer Mosquitoes

After leaving the beauty of the waterfalls my truck headed northwards towards the eco capital of the world (apparently), the little town of Bonito. Here I snorkelled in the crystal clear waters of a local river and saw an amazing variety of fish. These rivers are very well protected - you can only stand up in certain places so you don´t disturb the river bed. They also do not allow sun tan lotion or insect reppellent in the water. Makes perfect sense - this is why they have the clearest river water in the world, until you realise to get to the correct entry point into the river a 30 min walk through the jungle is required. You also have to wear a wet suit. Walking through the jungle in a wet suit, temperature over 35, wasn´t too bad. The fact that the wet suit stopped above the knees and no repellent is allowed is very bad. This region is famed for its mosquitoes but at the moment they are witnessing a record number of the little buggers. The guides have never seen anything like it. The record numbers have even made international news - great - and we were not allowed to wear repellent. I was lucky - I only got approximately 50 bites on my legs. Some pour souls had their faces chewed up - one lass has over 100 bites. Tip: never walk through a tropical jungle during record mossie season not wearing repellent - its not fun. The snorkelling though was well worth it. The fish had no problem with people and were swimming around - visibility was beyond belief - far better than the Carribbean Marine Reserve waters. I even saw a Caiman hiding out in its den under the surface!
From Bonito we entered the Pantanal. This is an area the size of France - it is incredibly humid - with alot of rivers. It is categorised as a giant swamp but it is a beautiful place. We had been warned about the bite through anything mosquitoes here but after Bonito they were in fact tame. I got to see so much wildlife here. People go on Safari into the Pantanal especially to see the birds. I saw Toucans, Tiger Herons, Storks, Eagles, Hawks to name a few. Also saw alot of Capivari´s which is the worlds largest rodent. They don´t do much and reminded me of wombats On one of the jeep safaris I took I also saw alot of caiman - they were in the water, sunbathing at the side of the road - some were even playing chicken with the jeep. Caiman are the smallest of the crocodile family and do not attact humans - we are far too big for them, so they are quite safe to be in close proximity to, both in and out of the water - unless of course you do something stupid such as trying to annoy it! Another thing that is present in the rivers here are Piranha fish. Our group went Piranha fishing - although we stood in the boat to do it. Between us we caught around12 and some of these were cooked up for tea. Piranha taste really good - one of the best fish I have eaten. Alas they are terribly boney and picking all the bones out gets very frustrating. Ah the price you have to pay in these parts to get a good meal!

What a Waterfall

Next stop on my journey north was Puerto Iguazu, home to the spectacular Iguazu falls. The rivers that contribute to these waterfalls are the natural boundries between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay. This natural phonenenum is simply magical. From the Argentinian side I walked around the falls and took a speedboat ride under some of them. To say I got wet is an understatement. Even in the high 30´s temperature it took me all day to dry out. It was so much fun though. Not only does Iguazu have 10 or so smaller waterfalls, it also has a huge one known as the devils throat. The best thing about the Argentinian side is that you can get so close to this fall and be amazed by the sheer volume and power of the water cascading just a few meters away from you. Not content with seeing this up close, the following day I crossed the border and viewed them from the Brazilian side. Again the views were breathtaking but I decided to go one better. I took a helicopter ride and went aerial. Helicopters are nothing like small planes, the ride is alot smoother but so much noisier. The copter turned sharply a couple of times and you can really feel the g-force on your body. This is something else I would definately do again. Damian you would have loved this! I am travelling with a few people who have seen both Niagra and Victoria falls and this place beats them hands down apparently. Because of the power of the river (its one of - if not the strongest river in the world), Foz de Iguazu (the town on the other side of the falls) is home to the worlds biggest hydro-electric dam. Itaipu Dam was built on the river that divides Brazil and Paraguay. It took over 9 years to complete and become operational but nows supplies 90% of Paraguays power and 25% of Brazil´s power. The volume of the water coming through its spillway is 40 times that of the water going over the falls. This part of the world really knows how to do huge fast flowing rivers. Iguazu is ismply one of the most magical places I have visited so far - the beauty of the place is astounding. You come away thinking how amazing the natural world can be - cheesy I know but true. This place also symbolises the last leg of the South American trip for me. I have left Argentina for the last time and I am now in Brazil. Only a couple of weeks left before the carnival starts!