So yesterday we were up early to get the bus from Rio to Angar dos Reis and from there to catch the ferry to Ilha Grande. The bus journey was very interesting as it took us through some of the poorest parts of Rio, the slums or favelas, to past some of the more luxurious beach
front condos - amazing contrasts within an hour or so of each other. The bus journey was very smooth and comfortable (unlike the ones in Rio) - a 'semi leito' with reclining seat, foot rest, bags of leg room, so much like our plane upgrade but for only £12.

Ilha Grande is beautiful and very chilled out, it's where Brazilians come to turn on, tune in and drop out. It was wonderful approaching it on the ferry, it looks like the Jurassic Park island - gorgeous beaches, lush tropical forest and its peak bathed in clouds. We were met by someone from the Pousada Naturalia who kindly took our bags from the harbour to our room. He put our bags in a wheeled cart and dragged in along paths and beach- this all because , to protect the island, there are no cars allowed. We've been given an upgraded here too as it's our honeymoon - ocean view room, better towels(!) and a bottle of champagne, which we sipped whilst swinging on our hammock looking out to sea.

The champagne was branded 'Chandon- product of Brazil'. Amazingly, this isn't a dodgy knock-off brand but actually a real branch of Moet & Chandon based in brazil to serve South America.

We took a walk to familiarise ourselves with the place befor dinner. This is something we usually do on our travels and involves finding and buying water, beer and ice cream. Unfortunately we've found a self service ice cream parlour, unfortunate because the ice cream is
amazing, it's self service and it is the Brazilian way to charge for food by weight - we're going to be very fat and very poor by the end of our stay here.

Dinner was 'local style'. This means meat served with rice, beans, chips and salad. And loads of it- at the same place you can spend twice as much on a plate of spaghetti but the local way is brill. The way they deal with carbs is fab - chips are not an alternative to rice, they comlpement them.