There is only really one word to describe Ilha Grande – BEAUTIFUL! As you will see from the photos, the tranquil, unspoilt beaches of this island were the perfect place for us to relax post-Carnaval madness! We took a 2 hour bus from Rio to the small town of Angra dos Reis (very picturesque with little houses set on a hilltop), and then a 2 hour boat ride out to the island. The blue colour of the sea was absolutely indescribable and we passed many other sma...

Sooooooo after a week of mosquito´s, no showers and a day of travelling from the jungle to reach Rio de Janeiro, we were truly appreciative of the warm welcome we got when we arrived at Brasil Hostel in an area called Lapa in Rio. We arrived pretty late, but as soon as we entered the doors of the hostel, there were tons of young people all in the party mood for carnaval! The hostel was brand new, clean and had a great little common area with bean bags and a...

After two flights, lots of waiting, three airports and three time zones we have finally reached RIO! Carnaval starts today, which we are both looking forward to having bought some masks yesterday. There are TONS of people here so looks like we´re in for a good time. The hostel is lovely, clean and HOT showers for the first time in Brazil which is much needed! Hopefully we´ll have some pictures in the next few days, so watch this space...

Our flight to Manaus was delayed ONCE AGAIN, but we arrived in one piece and caught a bus to the city centre. Whilst trying to figure out where to get off, we started chatting to a brazilian guy who spoke English, who helped us out and offered to help us find a hostel if we came to listen to his uncle tell us about a jungle tour, with no obligation to buy. We saw some pretty awful accomodation, before finally finding a fairly decent one in the form of Amazon Back...

We were only in Belem for a day, so checked straight into a hostel that Sandra had found, where we ran into Andres, an argentinian guy that she had met in another hostel. The four of us spent the day sight-seeing in Belem, checking out the squares, the colonial theatre and best of all the markets down by the docks. As it was Andres birthday the next day, and we were all sick of eating Brazilian food, we decided to cook birthday dinner and bought tons of vegetable...