September 2024

At the beginning of September we temporarily left Sao Paulo behind us and, using a rental car, drove to Rio de Janeiro. Rio is Brazil’s most famous city, but not the capital. That’s Brasilia. Rio is most known for its carnival, the statue of Christ the Redeemer and the beaches like Copacabana. We had booked a room at a hostel with a nice view in the popular and safe area Rio Sur. The hostel was on top of one of the many hills and the fact that we could only get to the hostel by climbing stairs was a bit of a surprise. As was the fact that it was in a favela. Favela’s have a bad reputation as they are often where the poorest people live in slum conditions and they are run by gangs who deal drugs and traffic people. Some of the favela’s the police won’t even go. However this favela just above the hip neighbourhood of Santa Teresa was a pacified favela. Which means its really safe and open to anyone, not just the people who live here. There were also no slum conditions and quite a few beautiful murals. More and more favela’s are pacified, but there are still no go areas. Rio is also known for its crime, if you look solely at the numbers, Rio is more dangerous than Sao Paulo. However there’s a big difference. In Rio the “bad” parts are far away from the tourist parts. So contrary to Sao Paulo, we did not have to engage with all the negative aspects of a big city. Yes Rio has addicts and homeless people, but there are few of them in the tourist part. The tourist areas of Rio are all in the area named Sur, which is the coastal area. This area is beautiful, colourful and safe, well mostly.

And we LOVED Rio. Its bright colourful and streets, the breezy atmosphere, the beautiful buildings, the nice restaurants and of course the sights were all we could have hoped for! Why couldn’t the car have broken down here?! We stayed five days, we wondered through the neighbourhoods, and visited the beach of Copacabana.

We climbed the Selaron steps, visited street markets and went out to dinner. And of course we visited Christ the Redeemer, which was by far the most touristy thing we did in a long time. Its incredible crowded up there and a hassle to get there. But something you have to do when in Rio. Sadly, after this great break, we then had to go back to Sao Paulo (SP), with its depressing buildings and filthy streets…

Back in SP we returned the rental car and waited around for the car the get ready. The date for the car to be ready was moved back several times which did nothing for our moods. Finally, finally at the 13th of September we could pick up the van. But while driving around the city there were some noises and the oil light was on. So instead of leaving SP behind us as soon as possible, we spend another weekend on the camp site so we could go back to the garage on Monday. Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning were then spend hanging around the garage while the mechanics and Kilian decided what to do for the best. In the end they decided not to replace the engine support blocks because it wasn’t necessary. A week later Kilian picked up a package containing, guess…. Yes, new engine support blocks and by now he also managed to find a replacement for the leaking oil filter bracket assy.

Well with the car finally almost fixed we could leave this horrible city behind us for good. On our way we just happened to come across a colourful town; Sao Luiz do Paraitinga.

After this colourful break we drove on towards the coast. Before we came to Brazil we had heard about the Brazilian beaches (who hasn’t) and were expecting some beautiful if not spectacular beaches. In reality we were quite disappointed to be honest. Very few shady campspots between palm trees at white sandy beaches and azure blue sea. There are some very nice beaches but few and far between. More often than not the coast is bare and windy, no (palm)trees, just some shrub. Any place you can get to by car has trash lying around. The sand is rarely white and the water is usually greenish/grey. Yes, we had the white sandy beach and we have seen some azure coloured sea, but it’s rare. And the coast is heavily populated so there are always other people around. I guess we were kind of expecting beaches like in Costa Rica, but that’s definitely not the case. That didn’t stop us from following the coastline while driving North though.

There aren’t that many roads and inland it’s difficult finding nice wild campspots too. I estimate that about 80-90% of Brazil is privatised which means a lot of land isn’t accessible. The parts that are accessible by car are almost always covered with trash. Brazil is what I call a “trashcan country” People treat nature like a trash can and have zero respect for it. Which is really sad and not something I will ever get used too. The Brazilians are used to it, they will just eat their food next to the trash and then add more trash to the area. It’s not the first country we have seen this, but it is pretty bad here and all the worse, given Brazil’s biodiversity. In Dutch we have a saying; “parelen voor de zwijnen gooien”, throwing pearls to the pigs. This means people don’t appreciate the beautiful things they have. And the amount of plastic bags here is insane! Every time I go to a shop and I don’t want a plastic bag, they don’t understand. Even if I’m literally waving my cotton bag in front of their nose, they will look at me not understanding, while putting my items in a plastic bag, which I then take out and put them in my own bag. At one point someone even went in to the supermarket to find the price for my own, brought in, bag…. Of course there are Brazilians who do care and there are places without trash, its rare though. Well enough of the trash talk for now.

Late September we arrived in Caveiras a colourful touristy town between the ocean and a laguna. We spend several days there, wildcamping directly at the beach and having drinks and snacks at some lovely beach side restaurants. This gave us some much needed holiday feeling. Vanlife isn’t a holiday but we all need to feel like that sometimes to deal with the every day challenges, whether you live in a villa or a van.

We ended September camping a few days at a small spring lake with crystal clear green water. Truly beautiful, if it hadn’t been for the trash lying around the small lake…

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