Ilha Grande

At Mom's (not-so) subtle request:

Last weekend Galen, Nicole, Arthur, Arthur's 2 good friends Kathy and Christina and I traveled to Ilha Grande - an island about 2 hours south of Rio - for the weekend.

I had a meeting that didn't end until a bit after 1:00 on Friday so Galen (graciously) waited for me and we met up at the bus station. Naturally, since apparently traveling can never be easy in this country (at least for me), we got there about 35.581081385 seconds after the 2:00 bus left, so had to amuse ourselves in the bus station for an hour and then catch the 3:00.
There are two towns where one can catch a ferry to Ilha Grande - Mangaratiba and Angra. Mangaratiba is about 30 minutes closer by bus to Rio, but the guy at the bus station told us that there were more boats leaving from Angra, and since we had missed the 3:00 Mangartiba ferry, we should just go to Angra and get a water-taxi to the island (otherwise we'd have to wait in Mangaratiba for the next ferry... at 10:00pm). We got on our bus and headed down to Angra, getting there about 5:45. When we were about half an hour out of Angra, it started POURING rain. Kind of a bummer since we were headed to an island renowned for its beaches, but we were both intrigued by the idea of taking a boat to the island in the rain - something very exotic and tropical about it!
Well, we got to Angra and had THOSE dreams immediately dashed - apparently since it was starting to get dark and (more importantly) it was pouring rain, none of the taxis would be running any more that night. We made friends at the little tourism-info-desk in the bus station and asked them about 5 different times in 5 different ways if there was ANY way we could get to the island from Angra.... but the answer was always "no." (even though I think they liked us).
If we had been 35.581081385 seconds earlier to the bus station in Rio, we would have been in Angra an hour earlier, and thus beat both the rain & the dusk... and been on the island by around 6. Instead...
Back on the bus, to Mangaratiba. The bus (which was on it's way back to Rio) was considerate enough to drop us off on the edge of the highway in the middle of nowhere by a road which headed to Mangaratiba, with explicit instructions to "Eh, go over there and wait for another bus." "Which bus?" "It'll say 'Mangaratiba.'" Right. Stood in the downpour at a "bus stop" watching small-town-Brazil life crawl by and waited for our mystery bus. When it hadn't materialized in about a half-hour, we managed to flag a kombi (kind of an unofficial bus - usually of the Volkswagen breed) driven by a toothless-yet-chatty gentleman who finally delivered us to Mangaratiba , where we sat and amused ourselves (It's a damn good thing that 2 guys in their 20's can still be fully entertained by hangman tournaments on restaurant paper table-cloths) until the 10:00 ferry.
Finally completed the 3.5 hour trip after about 9.5 hours. But it was worth it!

Ilha Grande has a pretty interesting history. To be honest, I'm too lazy to look up specifics, but (based mostly on hearsay) throughout history it's been home to two notorious prisons (at different times) as well as a popular stopover for smugglers and pirates. It's remained mostly undeveloped (due to the prisons), with only a few small towns, and almost no cars on the island. The most recent prison was only closed (relatively) recently, and since opening up to tourism it's apparently been somewhat of an experiment in sustainable tourism. There is (again, based on hearsay) no foreign investment in tourism on the island, so all the hostels and pousadas (guest-houses) and other tourist-businesses are owned and run by locals. Most of the island (I believe it's the 3rd largest island in Brazil) is completely covered in Atlantic rain forest. Everywhere you look is green, the waters are crystal clear and perfectly blue, and it looks like the kind of place where at any moment you'll hear "Yo-ho, yo-ho" approaching from the distance. Basically, it's unbelievably beautiful... the kind of place that's hard to believe still exists today.

Despite the rainy weather, we decided to spend Saturday hiking. Just wandering through the forest was amazing, and the off-and-on rain made it just feel that much more exotic. We hiked to a natural pool formed at the base of a small waterfall in a freshwater stream. Nearby to this stream were the ruins of a couple-hundred-year-old aqueduct that used to be used to bring water to the city (and which, being guys, Galen and I were obligated to climb on top of). We then continued on to a more serious waterfall further in the forest. I still have no idea how you're supposed to get to this waterfall, because we definitely took the most convoluted route possible (including using vines to repel down short rock-faces).
[A cool side-note: almost all of the paths used to hike around the island today are the same paths that were used by the natives who lived on the island before the time of colonization]
Up above the waterfall, Galen discovered a fantastic natural water-slide, courtesy of smooth water-worn rock, slippery moss (as Nicole and Kathy demonstrated for us) and a well-placed pool. No, the slide did not end by going over the waterfall (fortunately or unfortunately)!
From there we hiked to a beach where we were able to catch a water-taxi back to Angra dos Reis (the main "town" on the island - where we were staying) and finish the day with a huge buffet dinner.

Sunday, Arthur, Christina and I decided to take a boat trip to a couple of the sites around the island. For R$15 (about US$7) we were taken around to a lagoon and 4 beaches around the island from 10:30 to 4:30... and they even served us some fruit for a snack! I don't remember the names of all the beaches, but the lagoon (Lagoa Azul) was incredible. Just floating in the crystal water and staring at the island, it felt like another world - or at least another century. The funniest part of the trip, however, was when another boat arrived in Lagoa Azul and, in the process of trying to drop anchor and park, collided with our boat. Nothing too terrible (just a little rip in the tarp over the deck), but the skipper's look was classic - he just stood and watched helplessly as the other boat loomed near, with an expression of "Are you serious?". The entire post-collision discussion between crews was communicated in shrugs.
For lunch, the boat dropped us off at a beach where Arthur, Christina and I shared some great fish (well, actually, Christina doesn't like fish... we had been talking about having chicken and then Arthur and I changed our minds in favor of fish - but unwittingly made that decision in Portuguese and forgot to confirm with Christina in a language she speaks! Sorry Christina!). And then on to a couple other beaches! The day itself was not incredibly eventful, but I don't think I've said "Wow, look at this!" so many times in a 6-hour period in my life.
We got back to Angra dos Reis at around 4:30, killed an hour with a leisurely tigela de acai, and hopped on the ferry back to Mangaratiba and (delightfully uneventfully) back to Rio.

I already want to go back! Why does this country have to be so big and have so many places I want to visit?

Ilha Grande

On an entirely different note: I had an hour-long in-depth conversation about movies, literature and music last night... all in Portuguese! Whoooaaaaa!

Update: Arthur's awesome and gave me all his pictures from Ilha Grande, so I made another album with a handful of them -

Ilha Grande from Arthur

Thanks Arthur!