Ilha Grande

7:30am: Alarm rings... snooze... snooze... snooze... snooze...

8:00am: Sit up in bed; monstrous hangover!!!

9:00am: Leave to get a 3 hour bus south to Angra.  Nice!

Oh, and I forgot to mention that since 9pm last night it started raining; and there’s no sign of stopping.

The 3 hour bus journey was followed by an hour sitting aimlessly in the bus terminal, eating crisps and nursing the headaches; to be then followed by a short trip to the ferry terminal and a 2 hour boat ride to an island off of the coast of Brazil south of Rio called IIha Grande.  This island is famous for its beaches, small town feel and no cars at all.  It is mostly made up of Jungle with picturesque beaches scattered all around the coastline.  Throughout the jungle there are several ‘trails’ that lead to the beaches and to a waterfall called Cachoeira da Feticeira.

The torrential rain continued as we got off of the boat and a had a 15 minute walk along muddy roads and up a pretty steep hill to the ‘Casa Verde’ hostel; which on first sight was a far cry from the hotel in Rio...  Firstly, to get through the gate you need to reach through and find the key attached to a piece of string and then blind negotiate the padlock on the inside.  The inside communal area is very cosy; TV and a sofa, a table at the back of the room for meals and several hammocks hung throughout living area and outside space.  The rooms were cool too; wooden shack like doors, bunk beds with clean sheets and an ensuite bathroom which isn’t the worst that I’ve experienced.

There were two English girls staying at the hostel - who we spent most of the time with and have arranged to meet in Paraty on Monday – a Swedish couple and a pretty weird Argentinean couple; the guy was really cool and spent most of the day lying in a hammock playing the guitar (a cracking rendition of ‘a message to you, Rudy’ was echoing through the island).  The hostel is run by a woman called Nijah; who can only be described as pretty mental.  So friendly and welcoming; however it’s safe to say that English is not one of her strong points.  She also had a cat and a dog called ‘Julie’, who was the cutest dog ever; but stank like an old dishcloth...

Ok, so the rain hasn’t stopped, hangover is still on and the POA is to grab something to eat and basically just chill-out for the evening with the two English girls that we’d met (Annabel and Julie).  In true hangover style we opted for noodles and Kate and I chose to ease ourselves back in slowly to the swing of things with a bottle of Chiles finest Red Wine.  At the time a sensible choice!  This was then followed quickly by 3 or 4 caiparinhas of the strongest kind and a couple of beers back at the hostel; just to wrap things up at 2 in the morning.

Breakfast at 9am the following morning was not a pretty sight on all accounts.  The hangover was safe to say gigantic, lasted the best part of the day; and no matter how much coffee and nurofen was consumed, it was going nowhere!!

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