Among the string of interesting travels I have taken over the last year which include Turkey, Italy, Spain, Greece, Qatar and Brazil, Brazil was definitely the most stand out experience. I didn't even realize when the 17 days of planned trip got over. The negative comments regarding the security conditions, though not entirely untrue, made sure that we planned everything well. The only thing that created some problem for us was the language barrier as very few Brazilians can understand English. I found communicating here to be a bigger problem than Beijing or Shanghai.
After 21 hours of long flight from Delhi, the first leg of journey started from Rio De Janeiro, a place most known for Carnival parties and fabulous beaches full of bikini clad gorgeous women. The very first day my mobile and debit card were stolen during a street party but that wasn't enough to ruin my carnival spirit. The fervent partying spirit continued and I spent next 5 days partying on the street with a zillion strong party hungry crowd or lying on one of the most popular beaches on the planet i.e. Copacabana (and Ipanema) . The carnival parade, with its amazing colors and grand scale, was definitely a once in a lifetime experience. As always met a wide variety of interesting people coming from diverse backgrounds including one Pakistani named Hasan who immediately became a good friend again raising the same question I have always had i.e. why can't India and Pakistan be good friends if their citizens can be whenever they meet in a third country!
Manaus, the capital of Amazonas (Amazon forest) was our next destination. A city so far from Rio that it took us almost 6 hours of flying time to reach there but every minute we spent there was worth it. The jungle tour was already arranged and the moment we arrived, our guide took us to a floating jungle lodge, which was 2 hours boat ride from Manaus upstream of River Niger-the name which sounded startlingly racist to me as the river's water was black in colour due to minerals deposited at the bottom! We spent next 3 days in the quite of dense Amazon forest swimming in the river, piranha fishing, alligator spotting and most importantly rejuvenating after a five day long party in Rio. Our guide, Max, was an interesting Swiss fellow who quit his Physics university studies in favor of settling in Amazon forest, where he was married to a Brazilian girl. Throughout the trip, his passion for nature was evident. Here also met a couple of interesting Indians and Srilankan Americans. Lot of mosquito repellents we were carrying definitely helped but things were not as scary as we normally read about Amazon. The last day we saw meeting of rivers, the spot where black water of River Niger meets with the white water coming from River Solomon creating two parallel contrasting streams flowing adjacent to each other for quite sometime before they lose their individuality.
The next destination of our journey was Salvador, the capital of Bahia state. This was the place where Portuguese started and did most of the African slave trade in Brazil which gave rise to unique blend of Afro-Brazilian culture. The old city center and Afro-Brazilian museum were quite nice attractions for a stay for 3 days but the safety concerns (also echoed by fellow travelers) kept us away from the roads and bars during the night.
As our outbound flight was from Sao Paulo, we decided to spend last two days there. Being the biggest Metro city in the southern hemisphere, Sao Paulo was just like any big city with very little to do or culture to experience apart from the Sao Paulo Museum of Arts, which had a nice collection of artwork ranging from Van Gough, Degas to Picasso and other contemporary artists . The last day we had nothing much to do and spent most of the time playing 29 and visiting a Zoo!
Overall I really liked the experience and given such startling beauty of women there, definitely wouldn't mind visiting that place again :)
After 21 hours of long flight from Delhi, the first leg of journey started from Rio De Janeiro, a place most known for Carnival parties and fabulous beaches full of bikini clad gorgeous women. The very first day my mobile and debit card were stolen during a street party but that wasn't enough to ruin my carnival spirit. The fervent partying spirit continued and I spent next 5 days partying on the street with a zillion strong party hungry crowd or lying on one of the most popular beaches on the planet i.e. Copacabana (and Ipanema) . The carnival parade, with its amazing colors and grand scale, was definitely a once in a lifetime experience. As always met a wide variety of interesting people coming from diverse backgrounds including one Pakistani named Hasan who immediately became a good friend again raising the same question I have always had i.e. why can't India and Pakistan be good friends if their citizens can be whenever they meet in a third country!
Manaus, the capital of Amazonas (Amazon forest) was our next destination. A city so far from Rio that it took us almost 6 hours of flying time to reach there but every minute we spent there was worth it. The jungle tour was already arranged and the moment we arrived, our guide took us to a floating jungle lodge, which was 2 hours boat ride from Manaus upstream of River Niger-the name which sounded startlingly racist to me as the river's water was black in colour due to minerals deposited at the bottom! We spent next 3 days in the quite of dense Amazon forest swimming in the river, piranha fishing, alligator spotting and most importantly rejuvenating after a five day long party in Rio. Our guide, Max, was an interesting Swiss fellow who quit his Physics university studies in favor of settling in Amazon forest, where he was married to a Brazilian girl. Throughout the trip, his passion for nature was evident. Here also met a couple of interesting Indians and Srilankan Americans. Lot of mosquito repellents we were carrying definitely helped but things were not as scary as we normally read about Amazon. The last day we saw meeting of rivers, the spot where black water of River Niger meets with the white water coming from River Solomon creating two parallel contrasting streams flowing adjacent to each other for quite sometime before they lose their individuality.
The next destination of our journey was Salvador, the capital of Bahia state. This was the place where Portuguese started and did most of the African slave trade in Brazil which gave rise to unique blend of Afro-Brazilian culture. The old city center and Afro-Brazilian museum were quite nice attractions for a stay for 3 days but the safety concerns (also echoed by fellow travelers) kept us away from the roads and bars during the night.
As our outbound flight was from Sao Paulo, we decided to spend last two days there. Being the biggest Metro city in the southern hemisphere, Sao Paulo was just like any big city with very little to do or culture to experience apart from the Sao Paulo Museum of Arts, which had a nice collection of artwork ranging from Van Gough, Degas to Picasso and other contemporary artists . The last day we had nothing much to do and spent most of the time playing 29 and visiting a Zoo!
Overall I really liked the experience and given such startling beauty of women there, definitely wouldn't mind visiting that place again :)
