Parana

Since last time, we~ve spent one night in Curitiba, which famously has the "best standard of living in Latin America", we found a surprising amount of edge in amongst the futuristic bus stops, well-planned civic green spaces and impressive cleanliness - at times it felt like we were actually in England. But not in a bad way. A bit shocked to see a couple of policemen laying into a group of teens hanging about drinking in the park (seemingly innocently enough, they didn~t look particularly menacing), smashing their bottles, whacking them with truncheons and - amazingly - pointing a gun to one of their heads!! Never seen that before! I guess the police in Curitiba aren~t quite down with the "progressive" policies of the city in general...










Next day we took the train journey to Paranagua, which went through mountain forests and gorges, all amazingly scenic - here~s an idea of it:










And, once the train had broken down and a replacement bus service (aarghh, even more like home!!) finally arrived, from there it was time to peg it to the ferry - only just making it in time- over to Ilha do Mel, which means "Honey Island". Yeesssssss! It transpired that once again our accommodation was a bit incoveniently located, in fact we would have to get a "nautical taxi" to the other, less populated, side of the island - ah, the nautical taxi is a speedboat! First time I~d ever been on one of those. Exciting, if slightly alarming, but I~m getting used to hair-raising public transport in Brazil by now...








After an inauspicious first night when we got caught in a storm as we took a torchlight stroll along the deserted beach, and then got bitten to f**k by mosquitoes overnight, the sun came out next day and as the water was amazingly clear, and a perfect temperature, we went for a few swims - hadn~t been able to swim much in Rio as the water was too filthy in Copacabana and a bit too wild in Ipanema!










There isn~t, to be fair, much else to do on the Ilha do Mel, and much as it fitted the general idea of a tropical paradise island, we couldn~t bear the mosquito bites any more after three nights and headed back to the mainland.

We~ve come back to "give Florianopolis one more chance", as Jonathan Richman once almost sang, though I should also give Paranagua (seen below) an honourable mention for the fantastic time we had there on our way back here - we managed to sample the local speciality, barreado, (meat stew cooked over 24 hours in a clay pot, served with rice, sauce and slices of banana! Better than feijoada, we both reckon. Especially when you~re allowed to go and help yourself to seconds) and encountered probably the friendliest population of our trip so far.



Lots of love to you all, we~ll be at Iguaçu Falls by the next time you hear from us...