curitiba, the train ride south, and the ilha do mel

if you're anything like me, you will be annoyed by the formatting of the captions in this post. i am on a computer with a "d" key that doesn't work, so every time i want to type d, i have to paste one in that i copied from somewhere else. once i do this, it takes on the formatting of where i copied it from. i didn't realize this until after i wrote everything, and the software isn't being helpful for reformatting it, so i'm just going to leave it. apologies. also, i found the apostrophe after i was most of the way through. feels like every keyboard i use is different!

curitiba´s pedestrian mall

ive finally started asking if i can take peoples photos

the wonderful market in curitiba, across from the bus station. only sorry my camera battery ran out before i could capture more

this one is more of a reference to see how the lansdcape changed over the train ride

can you spot the building (can i find the question mark: no)

down into the mist

and then out the bottom of it

kids would run along side the train, waving. at the start of the trip, we'd been handed a few cookies an crackers to munch on, and many people threw theirs out the windows to the kids, who ran around collecting them--that was clearly why they'd come out to wave. then the train tour guide told us (i think, it was in portuguese) not to do that, because a number of kids had been struck and killed by the train. 

the train isn't running to paranagua anymore, so i had to get off in moretes and buy a bus ticket. this was the start of me getting off some form of transportation, shouldering my two backpacks, and just starting to ask people questions about how to get to my next destination. everyone is very nice, but most people won't admit when they don't know the answer, an instead just tell you something vague, so they key is to constantly ask the next person for verification. most of my portuguese vocabulary consists of directional words.

paranagua, where i caught the ferry to the island. at this point i was in conversation with a kiwi, american and person of unidentified nationality who were also traveling to the island. these three men were the first men i came across who did not offer to help me with my bags. when we had dinner together later that night, the american was particularly rude to me, for unknown reasons. embarrassing, really. reinforced my commitment to saying that i'm from california, not the US, when people ask, which consistently gets me a better response.

just another man playing with his adorable kid. lots of shows of affection to be seen.

as we left paranagua

the hostel messed up my reservation, so instead of a bed in a shared room, i got a private suite upstairs in the back. awesome! slept 11 hours, then found a cheaper place to stay....

camping! finally broke out my new tent. was very happy to have that mesh surrounding at night.

my view from the tent. the painting is of the island, i was staying at the southern tip.

path to the beach

path to the other side of the island (10 minute walk), which faces the atlantic

there are no cars or roads on the island, so people move bundles around with these carts. except at high tide, when the sidewalk that is the beach is covered with water.

in case i'm giving the impression that the island is paradise, let me add that there are biting flies, which really hurt and aren't bothered by deet, an intense heat an humidity in which holding perfectly still in the shade is the only way to not sweat heavily, a sun that burns in about 15 minutes, and jellyfish (though not that many). so it was amazing, but not perfect, and i was glad to move on...to Rio!

i hadn't planned on coming to Rio, as I expected it to be too overwhelming (and it would have been), but in curitiba i met a fabulous couple who live here and they invited me to come use their spare bedroom. amazing. so i've been staying with them for the past few days. after almost loosing it in the overcrowded bus station, i made it to their modern, breezy apartment in a quiet neighborhood. friday was a lovely hike in the large park that covers most of the mountains behind the city, with views in all directions. saturday we went to christo redemptor and ipanema beach, took a nap, and then went clubbing from 11-3. there was a line to get in when we left. this place is crazy. they have a hand gesture that means "too many people" which you make by bringing all of your fingers together in a group with an upturned palm.

tomorrow i take a bus that has full fold out beds (picture business class flying) from rio to the pantanal (22 hours, $100). i'll spend a few days there, then cross bolivia to la paz, where i'm meeting up with a friend i met in BA. i've finally learned that where i am and what i'm seeing is a lot less important that who i'm with. 

i hope everyone is happy and healthy.

iguazu

 from rio iguazu. i'm staying on the argentine side, but also visited the brazil side. once i got off the (17 hour) bus from buenos aires, the hot steamy air hit me like a wall, and it only feels cool at about 6am. here are photos from the brazil side (day 1):

a coati, of the raccoon family

after standing in the mists

and from the argentinian side (day 2):

clara, a lovely aussie i met at the hostel and spent the day with. 

an alligator or crocodile, not sure which. took this from about two meters away. glad he wasn't hungry!

mom, this one's for you. this is a group of black crickets, which stick together to apear larger

my hostel. did i mention i'm paying (an expensive) $16 a night?

the bus leaves in an hour for curitiba, brazil, followed by a train ride to the coast. i hope everyone's well. thanks again to those staying in touch! 

uruguay and buenos aires

carla and me at an english speakers event where i learned how to describe city planning in spanish.

colonia, the western-most city in uruguay that faces onto the rio de la plata, which is so wide it looks like the sea. this was the only sunny day i got in my four days in uruguay. the old town of colonia was cute, but only took about an hour to walk around. 

sorry for the rotation, it won't upload properly. this is a view from the lighthouse in colonia, a town that was build by the portuguese to smuggle goods into spanish buenos aires.

colonia had a lot of fun old cars, like this one with the plants growing out of it. another car in front of the aquarium had two large paper machè fish in it (see below).

uruguay is well known for its tiles. this is an old painted map of the rio de la plata delta, with BA in the middle left and colonia across from it. montevideo, uruguay's capital, is in the upper middle, and the atlantic doesn't start until the far right. 

the hammock on the roof deck at my hostel in montevideo. a nice old building that would have been much more enjoyable in fair weather (it rained almost the whole time i was there).

a parade with drums that passed below the hostel. the drumming is a direct piece of cultural heritage from africa, this connection is much more called out and celebrated in uruguay that it is in BA (which is more euro-oriented), and there are many more similarities between montevideo and the US as well as brazil, that there are with BA. 

three pieces of delicious (if fatty) steak, a side salad, and a large glass of wine: $12.

four flights of a spiral staircase up from the second floor of the museum in montevideo. i was getting bored, so i stepped over the rope and climbed the stairs for a rainy view of the old city. there were no musuem guards in the whole place, which was a beautiful old palace. 

a lover's fountain, i'm assuming. the outside is coated in locks. 

the public squares at night. i walked home from a movie, when it had finally stopped raining, and felt totally safe walking through the city at 12.30 in the morning by myself. 

at the cementary in montevideo, facing out to the sea. a lot of people were visiting graves, and there were a ton of fresh flowers and live plants. 

puerto madero, the newest and most expensive neighborhood in BA, where all the capitalist infrastructure is located. lots of big glass buildings down here. the land was sold off in the 80's when everything was tanking (or so my bicycle guide tells me). farther left of the buildings behind me is a large ecological preserve, where carla and i went for a walk yesterday. we reached the river bank and put our feet it to cool off. finally, a warm spring day!

the pink house, where the president works but doesn't live. the white paint was mixed with horse or cow blood, depending on who you ask. amazing how close you can get to the building. nothing like the fear of attacks that the US has. 

i just bought my bus ticket for puerto iguazu. next stop, brazil!