Big Brazil (by Joe)

Allow me to state the obvious: Brazil is massive.

At just over 8.5 million square km (3.2 million square miles) it is the world´s 5th largest country after Russia, Canada, United States and China. Brazil is almost 1 million square kilometres bigger than Australia and over twice the size of India (6th and 7th largest respectively).

It stretches some 4,300 km across South America, has over 7000 km of coastline and it takes over three days to travel from north to south by express coach.

And the Amazon basin, which covers a full one-third of the country remains - despite continued encroachment - one of the world´s vastest unexplored wildernesses. It is fact there are indigenous tribes in the Amazon which live in such remote areas that they remain entirely un-contacted by the developed world.

Just consider that for a moment - there are people there who, despite 400 years of colonisation in South America, remain wholly oblivious to mankind´s incredible achievements in science, technology, medicine, transport, civilization and communications.

Indeed, senior anthropologists go as far as to claim that, outside certain areas of mid-west United States, these may be the only people on the planet unaware that Man U reclaimed the Premiership.

I say: spread the word.

Joe

Forever Santos (by Joe)

This is me dressed proudly in my all-new number 10 Santos FC shirt which I was given by Laura´s cousin, Mark. As an appointed Santos fan, I decided I´d better find out about them ...

So:

Santos (from the town of the same name on the coast of Sao Paulo State) was founded in 1912 and we won our first state tournament in 1935. Our home ground is the 20,000 capacity Urbano Caldeira (also known as Vila Belmiro).

As Boca Juniors of Buenos Aires is synonomous with Maradona, Santos is with Pelé. He joined the club aged 15 and played with us throughout his 17 year career (1956 - 1972), wearing the number 10 shirt.

With Pele in the side through the 60´s, we enjoyed an amazing golden era. We won two Intercontinental Cups (the global club championship), nine state championships, two Libertadores cups (the South American club championship) and six Brazilian championships.

However, when Pelé retired in ´72, the club went into decline and has only resurfaced as a major force in recent years. But, with investment from new Club President Marcelo Teixeira, we are now very much on the up - we won the Brazilian championship (the Campeonato Brasileiro) in 2002 and 2004 and came 4th last year.

... and my number 10 jersey? It is now worn by Brazilian international, Robinho.

Further info:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santos_Futebol_Clube

Joe

Her name is Rio ... (by Joe)

"Her name is Rio", sang Duran Duran - "... and she´s a filthy old slapper", was our initial impression to be honest.

We´d arrived at a dilapidated bus station, been driven under grey skies and flyovers, through a charmless concrete jungle to a dodgy hostel in a non-descript (if central) neighbourhood and handed the keys to the windowless room next to the late-night bar (and in Rio ´late-night´ actually means ´early-morning´ we learned later ... much later).

BUT despite our initial assessment we came to like Rio very much.

There have been but a few sights on our trip such as Iguassu, Sydney Harbour and the Taj - which have instantly made our spirits soar high above the day-to-day - and taking in the panorama and then watching the sunset over Rio from the top of Sugar Loaf mountain (that with the cable car from the Bond movie) was certainly one of them.

Yet stunning from on high, Rio is not so at street-level. It´s a city of scattered districts held together by wide urban highways. The streets are tired and architecture is invariably concrete high-rise.

Even the beaches (right), whilst naturally beautiful are dirty on close inspection and backed by huge development (the 4 square km area immediately behind Copacabana, for example, has a population of 250,000 making it one of the highest population densities in the world). On top that it´s hard to relax because personal security is always an issue.

Still, we liked very much the people we met in Rio, who, as with everyone we´ve met in Brazil are ridiculously wholehearted, warm and friendly (to the point of lunacy). So, lifted by our Sugar Loaf trip and buoyed by the people, we managed to enjoy (safely) a taste of the nightlife with drinks on some of the pavement bars until late.

And after more than a few drinks we came to the conclusion that it would be wholly unfair to think of Rio as an ´old slapper´ - rather, she´s more like your classic middle-aged Richmond wife: striking when spotted from a distance, she´s clearly a bit past her best on closer inspection, but once you get to know her, you find that the old girl´s still good for a big night out.

Joe

My family and other animals (by Laura)

My uncle and aunt (Richard and Vicky) and three Brazilian cousins (Mark, Jason and Nina) have lived in Sao Paulo nearly all their lives. The last time I visited was at the tender age of fourteen and Joe and I have been talking about a visit for so long that it looked like it might never happen.

The Brazilian Stevenses live in a lovely leafy house in a southern Sao Paulo suburb. There, they have a full family of parents, children, grandchildren, (great) grandparent, cats, parrot, guinea pig, tortoises, terrapins, a loopy irish setter called Bruna and a very lovely, (apparently equally loopy) maid called Neusa (left). So a mighty busy thoroughfare.

Joe and I were lucky enough to visit when nearly all the family was around, and spent a weekend sampling Brazilian cuisine and being treated to their Brazilian hospitality.

For me, the chances to see my cousins, uncle and aunt are so few and far between, that it was wonderful to spend some proper time with them.

Sao Paulo is a city of apartment blocks and offices, stretching as far as the eye can see (right). But in between, there are also some very elegant buildings and plenty of relaxed and beautiful neighbourhoods. It was fascinating to see a city, for once, from the viewpoint of people that live there, and its size and population suddenly became far less overwhelming.

Over the weekend, we visited not only one of the city´s fabulous buffet restaurants (´Fogo do Chao´, where they carve the meat from swords onto your plate), but also went on a successful hunt for Brazil´s national dish, feijoada, a very filling bean, meat and rice dish (served up in restaurants on Wednesday and Saturdays), followed by the necessary and customary snooze. I could only look on in admiration at the quantities of cow consumed around me (as I polished off the last of the pao de queijo and my third veg buffet helping).

It was only for the sake of our ever-expanding girths that we decided to move on to the Sao Paulo coast. But since we´re on the same continent for once (and when we feel hungry again in a month or two), a return visit is definitely on the cards.

Laura

The big billboard debate (by Joe)

Having worked for a few years in advertising and specifically issues surrounding advertising regulation, I was fascinated to see this time and again around Sao Paulo: ad billboards stripped bare to their bones (top).

Apparently, it´s the result of new local laws which came into effect in March aimed at reducing the city´s ´visual pollution´. In effect, the laws limit radically the size of advertising hoardings which are deemed not to be ´in the public interest´. Even shops are not exempt and are currently in the process of stripping down all signage over a certain modest size (which certainly makes it hard to tell a chemist from a baker as you pass in a car).

And it´s not an issue exclusive to Sao Paulo - the same discussions are taking place in many cities. For example, in New Zealand we were aware of legislation being drafted which could similarly clear away the vast majority of billboards from its major cities.

Of course there are two sides to the debate. Do advertising hoardings actually make the urban landscape less attractive or do they cover, with colour and often with humour, the sides of otherwise unsightly and little-loved buildings? Interesting place though it is, Sao Paulo is never going to be one of the world´s most beautiful cities - advertising hoardings or not.

Also, who exactly should be trusted to decide what messages are ´in the public interest´ - politicians, regulators? It is certainly a fairly significant power to hand out ...

Whatever the arguments, there are two nail-down certainties from the whole thing:

1) In the UK and Europe, JCDecaux, Maiden and the others will - and should - be taking note.

2) The few Sao Paulo advertisers that are shrewd, brave or stupid enough not to have responded to the new rules will now be achieving a mighy impact with all competitive ´clutter´ cleared. So ´The Producers´ can expect strong audiences, I reckon!! (see left).

Joe

What´s your Cama? (by Joe)

Travelling, we´ve found ourselves taking some mighty bus journeys all over the place.

We took some crazy trips in India, South East Asia and Australia, but in South America we´ve found things taken to new levels, with overnight journeys of 18 hours(+) not uncommon due to the massive distances to be covered.

But here, long-distance doesn´t necessarily mean long-suffering due to the quality of services, which, especially in Argentina, resemble more British Airways first class than National Express intercity.

There´s a huge choice of bus companies from which to choose your ´cama´ (bed). You can have standard reclining, executive semi-cama (effectively a bed at 60 degrees), coche-cama or suite premium (the full monty) which gives you wide, heavily-padded seats that recline the full 180 degrees.

And intense competiton has led to all sorts of frills: DVD movies, high quality dinners, unlimited wine, and on some services, champagne, all included in the price. We´ve almost come to look forward to our long-distance trips as providing a night of luxury on our otherwise budget tour (see Laura settling in for a comfy night - right).

Still, whatever the comfort of the cama or quality of service, when you board the bus and look around your fellow passengers, there remains one uncontrollable dark shadow at the back of your mind: that bloke in the cama behind ... is he a sweet sleeper or a filthy snorer?

Joe

Mighty Itaipu (by Joe)

The Iguazu Falls may well be one of the natural wonders of the world (see blog below), but on a different river, less than 50 kilometres away lies one of the undoubted man-made wonders of the world: the Itaipu Dam.

A joint initiative between Brazil and Paraguay and becoming active in 1984, this is currently the world´s biggest hydro-electric power station (to be superceded by China´s Three Gorges dam), providing a whopping 95% of the electricity for Paraguay and over 20% of the electricity for Brazil.

We went along to see it on a cloudy, wet afternoon and before getting absolutely drenched by a tropical storm, sat through a very interesting (if suspiciously slick and defensive) corporate video which provided some great stats to illustrate its scale.

- The iron and steel used to build it would be enough to build 380 Eiffel Towers
- The height of the dam (196 metres) is the same as a 63 storey building
- Brazil would burn 434,000 barrels of oil a day were it not for the dam
- 12.6 million cubic metres of concrete were used in construction
- The rock and earth excavations at Itaipu were 8.5 times more than those of the Eurotunnel

It was a tremendously impressive thing to visit - certainly the biggest man-made structure I have ever seen. Iguazu tends to be the bigger attraction in the area, but in its own ´feat-of-engineering´ way, we found Itaipu just as awe-inspiring.

Joe

Iguazu (by Joe)

I´ve always felt that waterfalls are generally overrated as sights to see.

One of the recurring experiences we had through South East Asia was that we´d pop along to the tourist office of whatever town we were in and ask what there was to do in the area. Almost invariably we´d immediately be told that we must visit the local waterfall. We´d then march several miles (uphill) to be confronted with a poor excuse for a dribble running a metre or two over a mossy rock.

This is definitely not the case, however, with the mighty Iguazu falls on the Brazil - Argentina border. Fed by 30 rivers, the falls comprise 275 separate drops of up to 74 metres, along a width of nearly three kilometres. The volume of water ranges from 1,750 cubic metres per second in dry season to 12,750 cubic metres in wet season (we went not in full wet season, but after heavy rains) . On both sides of the falls, there are wonderfully set up national parks with walkways over the river, around and in one case, under, the falls, giving you views from every angle and direction.

We spent a wonderful morning on either side watching (jaws dropped) at the volumes of tumbling water, and merrily snapping photos of the rainbows which appeared whenever the sun broke through the mist. It was truly a wonder to behold.

Here´s some pics:

However we also found another entertaining feature of the park on the Brazilian side - the consistently ropey translations of public information signs:

... most amusing!

Joe

At home in Buenos Aires (by Laura)

We had heard great things about Buenos Aires before arriving here, with people talking up its great atmosphere, fantastic restaurants and cosmopolitan style.

After three and a half months of staying in no one place for more than 2 or 3 days, we were mostly looking forward to hanging up clothes, being normal people again and having our own front door (not to mention the promise of English language cable TV).

Once we had picked up the keys to our apartment in trendy suburb Palermo and filled our fridge with all sorts of foody luxuries, we began to really feel at home.

Buenos Aires (so called after the ´Buen Ayre´ or good air, that used to bring sailors from across the seas) is a city of leafy streets, Parisian-style cafés (right) and high-rise, balconied apartment blocks. The streets are shaded and cool and there are fantastic colonial windows and doorways to be admired on every corner. In the evenings, as with many European cities, the shops stay open late and people hang around having coffees until well after sundown.

It is a city made for eating out, but there are also fabulous food markets (left) as well as little fresh pasta shops, selling takeaway sauces and homemade dishes at bargain prices.

So we developed a very comforting pattern for a week: Spanish school, shopping and gallery-hopping, then pasta, wine and a good film at home in the evenings. Such homebodies have we been, that you would never have guessed we were in a city that only starts to emerge of an evening at around 11pm. To be honest, we were tucked up in front of Friends with a mug of hot chocolate by that point.

Happily, we can come back and do it all properly when we fly out of here in a couple of months time.

Laura

Gooooaaaal !!! (by Joe)

Argentina, of course, is football crazy and Diego Maradona remains (despite everything) a national hero beyond measure.

The extent of this was brought home when I noticed that his second goal against England in the 1986 World Cup (not the hand of God one, the other one where he dribbled past 8 players plus the keeper and slotted it in the corner) was/ is celebrated here by a set of stamps (see top)!

Joe

Hablo Espanol (by Joe)

Of course it always helps to speak the language of countries you are visiting, but this is more the case in South American countries than anywhere else we've been: if you don't speak Spanish in South America, you're in trouble, because the locals rarely speak English.

To help tackle my lack of lingo, we listened to a 'Learn Spanish Phrases' CD around New Zealand. However, whilst this meant I was able to ask questions with a certain level of conviction, I remained entirely unable to understand any of the answers that come in response (and the better you ask the question, the faster the response!).

So, dependent on my interpreter-wife, I booked onto a 5-day Spanish course for our week in Buenos Aires.

Bright and enthusiastic on the first morning at school, I lined up alongside other 'freshers' for a brief introductory assessment test. I was in a hopeful mood, but merely a few mumbles later, found myself in a class all of my own and reading from photocopied sheets marked 'Spanish for beginners: Stage Zero - Level 1'.

The only way was up, however, and five days later I feel I was rolling irregular reflexive verbs off the tip of my tongue (even if I wasn't sure what half of them meant).

Nevertheless, it feels great to be able to speak even a little bit of the language. Keen to get practicing we're off to Brazil for a month now where they speak ... er, Portuguese, apparently.

Joe

Farewell, old friends (by Joe)

After six months on the road together, it came time recently to bid farewell to a pair of old friends: my Salamon all-weather walking shoes.

We've climbed mountains together, walked the streets of some of the world's greatest cities, shared long and winding journeys, and enjoyed bars, pubs and even the occasional dancefloor together.

I picked them up in Cotswold Outdoors in Kingston for less than 25 quid just before we left home.

They've served me well, but, now replaced by a smarter, cleaner new pair bought in Chile, it's time to leave them behind.

Farewell, old friends. You may be gone, but as long as I walk this earth you will not be forgotten.

Joe

Santa Laura (by Laura)

I could tell you that this wine is rich and velvety, with an aromatic bouquet of exotic fruits, and a hint of walnut and caramel.

In fact, it's cheap and rosy, and I found it on the bottom shelf at the supermarket.

Laura

Dulce de Leche (by Laura)

If you have yet to be introduced to this culinary marvel then feel free to put in an order and I can bring some back for you.

It is basically the midway point between condensed milk and fudge.

It is spread on toast and scones, used as a pancake filler or even eaten by itself. We can also vouch for the wonderful sickliness of dulce de leche mousse, dulce de leche icecream (see left) and dulce de leche pastries.

They sell it in litre plastic bags here and I love it.

Laura

Welsh connection (by Joe)

Running into a touring choir from Pembrokeshire recently underlined the surprising Welsh connection that exists in these parts, especially in the northern areas of Patagonia.

Apparently Welsh settlers first arrived in Puerto Madryn, on the coast of northern Patagonia in 1865. With the support of the Argentine Government, the colony flourished for some years, but suffered a devastating flood in 1899 which led to the Welsh spreading widely across the country.

You can see the connection in the popularity of rugby here in Argentina, but also - perhaps surprisingly - in the widespread availability of Welsh teas and Welsh cakes (see Welsh cafe - top).

Joe