Paraty

So right now I am in a hostel in the colonial town of Paraty. We are most likely leaving to Rio by bus tonight. We might stay the night and leave tomorrow morning. This might be cutting it close, however, because we are supposed to eat lunch with marcello again and I also need to prepare my bags for my departure (tomorrow!!!).

I dont feel like writing anything right now, my nose is clogged from yesterday. I think I caught another nose infection cold thing from too much salt water swimming. My nose is still releasing salt water every few hours...

...Continued Thursday...

We arrived in Paraty Monday at 20h. The bus ride from Rio lasted 4 hours and went through some very windy coastal roads. After wadering off with two other Americans (Mary and Dave), towards the "oscuridad" as our direction-giver put it, we finally found our hostel. A very nice place, right on the Paraty River, with all the ammenities one could ask for (e.g. chess set). We met a Dutch man named Ohlaf and after settling in we proceeded to explore the town. Paraty is very beautiful. It is on the coast and has been there for more than 2 centuries. It retains its Portuguese style architecture throughout much of the town.

Tuesday we went on a boat tour of the nearby islands. Our Capitan was this funny looking guy wiht dreads and braces. He took us to four different islands the last one being the most. Pictures will come soon. I didn't hesitate to go rock climbing... That is, climbing rocks from the water. In order to do this I had to swim out quite far, I'd say more than 2 km round trip. Good thing I float in salt water. Anyway, I didnt climb shit because of the barnacles that were surrounding every single possible rock. The only thing I did do was lacerate my hands and feet to a bloody pulp. Barnacles are very sharp, especially when your hands are softened by water... oowww....
On this trip I met some nice French guys from Paris, Bruno (FUKS) and Guillaume. I also sympatised with a Brazilian and later with Mary on the rocks of the last island.
This boat trip formed a little 'group' of people consisting of those just mentioned and a few others. That same night, all famished from sunbathing, we bought groceries and made ourselves a delicious spaghetti dinner. By this time I was deathly sick from something having to do with swimming and went back to my room where I passed out. I woke up and we went out to the center and chilled at a bar and had beers. We were all quite drunk from richard's Caipirina and the two bottles of Chilean wine we had with dinner.

Wednesday was Trinidade day. A gorgeous beach about 40 min south of Paraty. Stayed there til 4pm. Got back at the hostel and chilled for a bit, then bought some souvenirs. Then had a rushed rodizio pizza dinner which was absolute shit. I arrived at our bus about 30 seconds before it took off for Rio. Too bad we didnt geto say goodbye more properly to our newfound hostel friends. We got some email addresses which should help for staying in touch (Mary said I should come visit her in L.A.)
The ride back to Rio from Paraty was total shit. I couldnt sleep, was still sick from the day before and was totally dehydrated from blowing my nose so much. Plus Richard for some reason, was being extra annoying. Luckly I was able to drown my sorrows into Dan's mp3 player thus blocking out Richard's almighty annoyance.

continued on next post