After getting to Paraty, we immediately fell in love with the place. Wikipedia describes the place as
“…located on the Bay of Ilha Grande, which is dotted with many tropical islands. Rising up as high as 1,300 meters behind the town are tropical forests, mountains, and waterfalls.”
What it doesn’t tell you is that it’s the most beautiful place ever, has over a 100 beaches within an hour bus ride and has an incredibly relaxed atmosphere which we fell in love with immediately. After months of planning to get away, the last few weeks in work being crazy and the hard slog of the Inca trail we decided that it was time to chill and that Paraty was going to be the place to do it. Having pre-booked 3 nights we quickly realised that 3 nights wouldn’t be enough and wanted to stay here for the rest of the week.
Our hostel was located directly across from a small beach, serving good, cheap food every night and had some good staff (aside from one stupid bint – ask Leah when you speak to her next and she’ll have the pleasure of telling you the story….)
The 4 hour bus journey went without any mishaps on my behalf; I’d employed the services of a cork for the bus. After getting to Paraty, we grabbed a shower, unpacked our stuff and sent our first load of washing off to be cleaned (Leah approved of the launderette because the towels smelled nice…)
We awoke to our first day of “proper” sun and off to be the beach we went, factor 30 covering my pasty white body. I’d set up stall for the day and intended on getting a tan! After 2 hours in the sun I was sweating like *insert your chosen sweating phrase* so decided a quick swim was in order! After my best Duncan Goodhew impression and I’m back on dry land. Now as any seasoned sun worshipper knows, there’s no point in putting sun cream on a wet body, so rather than towel dry myself and risk the annoyance of rubbing sand on to my body I thought – “I’ll let the sun dry my skin!” and this is where it all went wrong for me, 15mins later and I’m as dry as a bone. However, this was at the expense of my skin. I’ve had sunburn before, who hasn’t? But I certainly have never had sunburn in my armpits before! Now the next two days are spent with me looking like a Rhondda boy with my arms at last 8inches away from my sides. Who needs carpets under your armpits when you can’t physically put your arms by your side! (Don’t even ask how I did it but needless to say I won’t be lying on my back, reading my book again!)
The next few days were spent in the shade when there was sun but generally we had some poor weather which neither of us were bothered about as it was just nice to sit, surf the net and read a book. We did however, manage to get ourselves on to a boat trip where we spent the day snorkelling and swimming with turtles!
Now, my boss wasn’t too happy about me leaving my job and on my final day said to me -
“So this is you off to go and do your “thing”?”
The day spent on the boat, finally made me realise that yes, this is me doing my “thing”…. [Insert the biggest smile you can ever possibly find….]
Fortunately, the sickness and dodgy stomach has now lifted and we’re both able to start eating again! Dry food was the only source of vitamins, minerals and energy for nearly 5 days, thankfully pasta, freshly caught fish and meat are now on the menu, I can’t wait!
We have been fortunate to meet lots of different people so far, our hostel in Paraty was a stopping point for the journey from Sao Paulo to Rio and we were able to quiz other people and gather lots of information. One destination that kept popping up was Ilha Grande, which by the sounds of it is a bit of an oasis with, no roads, no internet, no cashpoints and just lots of beautiful beaches littered with chilled out bars! Sounds like the perfect place for Leah to spend her birthday weekend.
We’re currently on the way there, more to update once we’re back in civilisation!
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