Paia Guas Palace Cuiaba

... me in his car to the impossible to find mythical hostel, what a top bloke. I would have really struggled without his help. He even gave me his phone number and said If needed anything I could call him. I've treated myself to an air conditioned room at the hostel, I have a hammock, ensuite bathroom and even a TV, which doesn't work, wouldn't have watched it anyway. Very luxurious for my usual standard of digs. I thought I'd treat myself, I'll be seriously roughing it soon ...

Words fail to describe our Pantanal experience. Definitely a highlight of not only our travels in Brazil but also South America. Although it got off to a rocky start as we had forgotten to send important details to Ailton our guide, such as our arrival date and flight details, we soon managed to get it all back on track. Our tour was over three nights and four days with only one other couple from Italy. We all cram packed ourselves into the small Fiat tight as sardines in a can with not an ...

PANTANAL Ankomst Cuiaba etter en times flytur. En liten tjokk dame prikker oss paa ryggen i ankomsthallen: " Hello! You want to see animals? You want to go on guided tour? I give you good price!"Osv osv.. Tilslutt havnet vi midt oppi en meget hoylytt krangel hvor tre operatoerer kranglet om oss!! De rakker ned paa hverandre og vi trekker oss unna for aa spise litt. Puh - hyggelig ankomst! Men ...

... their dazzling beaks across the sky in front of us. Later on a couple of macaws caused us to contort our necks in an effort to gaze upon them for as long as possible. We've seen these birds before in cages but never in the wild except in Mexico and Guatemala. Trying to take photos necessitates more twisted body maneuvers which so far falls short of a successful shot. Every day we see brightly colored flying things which is a welcoming balance to the beaten track we are following these days.

The longest bus trip! To get from Foz do Igauçu to our next stop, the Pantanals, we had to get another bus. I know I complained a little about the 10 hour trip from SP to Foz, but that´s before I knew about this 28+ hour mother of a trip! To begin, we left the Iguaçu hostel round 10:30am on the little free bus, and met up with some Germans we keep crossing paths with. They had some un-nerving news. The previous night a bus load of tourists and locals coming from SP to Foz on ...

... smug. That lasted the sum of about 30 seconds before we realised that there was no way of avoiding the next big space of water. Bugger. So we waded through, the water was mid-shin level, quickly ...

... br>
The big group also meant that we had to take one horse away from its newly arrived foal, which it understandably didn't appear to be too happy about.

After setting off, the first obstacle to cross was a very deep stretch of water, after which we ...

... Mr & Mrs Fey were particularly looking forward to it!

We weren't quite sure what exactly it would entail, but it certainly sounded like something we were unlikely to be able to repeat in Islington.

The only problem with the timing was that Liverpool's crucial Champions League 1/4 final first leg game against Arsenal started at 3:45pm and we were due to start the fishing expedition at 4pm! D'OH.

I sat and watched the start of the game ...

... unpleasant, we've arrived in the "receding flood" season, so there's water everywhere but it´s not raining.

Indeed the sun definitely had his hat on when we arrived and thankfully the van had air conditioning!



After about 45 minutes we turned off the asphalt road and onto a dirt track, which ...

A melhor maneira de saber o que se fazer em um projeto missionário é orar. E foi justamente isso que fizemos. Nossa primeira atividade após nosso planejamento é a oração. Resolvemos orar por toda a universidade. Orar em torno da universidade e em cada um dos institutos também. A oração nos direciona e abre os caminhos para o evangelismo. Achei muito interessante uma coisa que aconteceu neste projeto, conversei com Márcio e Savana, que tamb ...