Brotas

We took the bus on Friday morning and arrived around 4. Diane booked this package deal of hotel, rafting, canyoning, and zip lining, so we thought we wouldn't need to worry about any transportation once we got there. Brotas seemed pretty touristy on the websites. But when we got to the bus stop, there was nothing. No information at all, let alone in English. And it turns out our hotel was actually in a different city, 15 miles away. So we spent a few minutes wandering around looking lost--lost enough that finally this girl waved us over and asked where we were from. Her English was so good that I asked where she was from, too, and she said she was Brazilian but had just returned from a 2 year nannying stint in Atlanta (what are the odds?). She offered to direct us to our hotel, and when we showed her the map she told us how far it was, and then she offered to drive us. For once Diane was more hesitant than I, but we didn't have much choice. So Maria drove us all the way to the other city, gave us her number, and told us we could sleep at her house on Sunday night (the hotel was only for 2 nights, but no buses sleave on Sundays).

On Saturday we went rafting, which was really fun, although not very challenging. They put 7 people in each raft, plus a tour guide, and I'm pretty sure he did all the work from the back corner. But it was fun to learn commands for steering: "frente" (frenchay)=forward, "re"(hey)=back, "piso"(peeso)=get down in the boat and hold on. And our war cry, which I never said right, was "Nos capotas mais nao brakas!" or something like that, which means, we may roll, but we don't break!

After that we went canyoning, which again wasnt very challenging but was beautiful. You might know this, but it's essentially rapelling but with water. So we rapelled down sthree waterfalls, and hiked a little ways through the water. It was great except when the guide showed me a spider the size of my palm lurking on the rocks we were climbing over.

On Sunday we went on the "Voo de Tarzan" zipline. It's apparently the longest, or highest, or both, zipline in Brazil. I thought it'd be a rush of adrenaline, but again it was just beautiful, kind of slow-paced soaring over the jungle. After that we went on a short hike to another waterfall, which was in this secluded hollow and literally had rainbows and butterflies flitting around it. We went and stood under the waterfall and said, we have done everything we could do in a waterfall, short of actually jumping down one: we've been in the top of a waterfall, in the bottom of a waterfall, in the middle of a waterfall, rapelled down next to a waterfall, seen famous waterfalls, seen secret waterfalls, stood in waterfalls with our clothes on, stood in waterfalls with just our swimsuits on, seen another country from a waterfall, seen waterfalls legally, and seen waterfalls illegally. So we were pretty proud of ourselves.

After that we checked out of the hotel and went back to Brotas. We didn't want to impose on Maria longer than we had to, so we had a few hours to kill. We bought some souvenirs and then wandered around, looking for all the people in Brotas, since it was practically empty. And then, when we wandered along the river in the middle of town, we found them. They were all swimming in the river and fullfilling our Waterfall Destiny: jumping down a waterfall. There were all these guys doing crazy dives and flips from the top of a waterfall, and Diane and I thought, we have to try. So we changed into our swimmies and went down to the water. The current was relatively strong, but we made it to the rocks in the middle and climbed up. We stood at the top and contemplated for a long, long time, while the guys chattered at us and told us it was fun and safe. It was probably 10-12 feet high, so not too bad, but we were afraid of slipping and hitting some unknown rock. But we finally went, and I got the adrenaline rush I'd been missing for the whole trip. It was so, so fun and we went 2 more times before we changed and called Maria again.

That sums it up, except for Maria's absurdly kind hospitality.