São Paulo, Brazil

First on my list of places to see while in South America was Brazil. It has taken us a while to get there, but it was definitely worth the wait.  And then some.  In short, Brazil knocked our socks off. 

When you look at South America on the maps, you can see that Brazil is a large country, but I had no idea just how large. A Brazilian on our flight explained that Brazil was the size of the US, and would be considered larger than the US if we didn't include Alaska. He was very bitter about Alaska. Because there is so much of Brazil to see, and because travel and lodging within Brazil is incredibly expensive, we opted for a cruise. Since São Paulo was our departure port, we padded the trip with a few extra days to explore before setting sail.

This city is called the helicopter capital of the world. It is said that the traffic is so bad that wealthly families in São Paulo buy into helicopter co-ops and opt to fly to work. It has become a status symbol among the city's elite, much like perma-tans and ridiculous amounts of plastic surgery means wealthy in BA. Heliports dot many of the local buildings and helicopters were constantly flying overhead. 

As always, there was so much to see and so little time. We made full use of the subway system, which was so clean and easy to use, and stopped at the Museu do Futebol to honor Pele, soccer legend and Brazil native. Also on the agenda was Paulista Avenue and the Jardin neighborhood, which was full of rain forest-like parks and memorials. We stopped by their beautiful national theatre and checked out the downtown area.

The stadium above the museum.

What we really liked was the availability & variety of fruits, fresh fish and real sushi, and "early" restaurant dinner times (6pm-yay). We also really appreciated that flip flops and shorts were the norm--it's much more casual than where we live and we didn't feel like the sloppy Americans for once! We did notice a very large homeless population and wondered about the welfare-type programs within Brazil. With sky high prices, I'm certain that there's a huge class disparity.


Our next stop: Rio. It may be my favorite city in the world.

Brazil's famous Havaiana flip flops. Teague couldn't live without a glow-in-the-dark pair.

Around the corner from Plaza Buenos Aires. I just love the tropical feel and bright colors.

The less savory part of the city, packed with little shacks.