South America, Day Eleven: Paraty

The 8am bus meant getting out of bed at 6am. By that point of the trip that time of day felt early - particularly seeing as how 6am was when my flight took off just the day before. It did feel weird that I was staying in Sao Paulo for less than 24 hours, but I quickly got over that.

The bus station was simple yet impressive and we got our tickets in good time. Since buses are all about convenience we were going to take a big portion of the quick inland rather than slower coastal route like we would have done via a rented car. The upshot of this was that we could sleep on the way since there was nothing much to see. The entertainment on board was Rug Rats: The Movie which made me smile.

The gorgeous weather broke out just as we joined the coast. It suddenly and finally felt like I was in Brazil, which made me reassess where exactly I thought I had been the past couple of days.



We arrived in Paraty at around 2pm. After spending a couple of hours faffing around with lunch and finding accommodation a random guy handing out leaflets pointed us to a pousada a little way out of the historic centre. It was a lovely place and totally fitting in with the vibe of the town itself.

With the logistics out of the way I spent a little time exploring the historic centre. Full of charm, it became apparent that Paraty was a place to chill rather than tour and it was almost as if each building had its own quirk and story. I visited a cooking school, a world-class spa, a jazz cafe with live music and even spent a few moments watching a class of kids dancing in the street to live musicians. It was a little quiet with respect to people, but unlike Santiago this was in a good rather than bad way. Even the river was alluring, but although the cobbled stones looked good they killed me in my flip flops.



Although I have nothing in particular to talk about with regards to Paraty, it is by far one of the best places I visited during my stay in South America. And that's not bad, especially when you consider how it wasn't even on the original itinerary. Heck, I hadn't even heard of the place ten days ago.