Bye, Brazil! We’ll see you again!

This is the last post (for now) of our Brazil series. We were in Brazil from October 2016 to January 2017.

We arrived thinking we’d get to travel around Brazil a lot, but we spent a lot of that time sick. I’m guessing at least a month was spent sick somehow – asthma, cold, allergies, digestion problems, fever, and I can’t even remember. We were sick for almost all of the first month and then a little here and there. It was not fun.
When we got better, it was (almost) summer holidays so everything was super expensive and impossible.

We ended up doing very little but it was still good.

Salvador and it’s colorful Bomfim strips

Salvador was our first trip and it was lovely. We had the beach, the sun and a lovely time.

We also went to Ilha Comprida – and went to Cananéia and Cardoso Island from there. It wasn’t worth it.

Most of our time was spent in between Itanhaém and Mogi das Cruzes. Unfortunately, we didn’t explore Mogi das Cruzes as we’d wanted to. We did, although, explore a bit of São Paulo.

We were fortunate enough to have found Hertz rent-a-car, as they offered us a good monthly deal and made it possible for us to have a car throughout our stay.

And we even got ourselves a nice Espace60 game! It was one of the trips’ highlights!

Cupuaçu ice cream from A Cubana – yum!

We ate a lot of delicious food, including pastel at the street markets.

We didn’t pay for rent (and paid for very little food) because my mom and uncle provided us with all we needed. So we managed to eat out a lot.

Our last night was spent in Matiz, a hotel near the airport. We decided to spend the last night in a hotel because our flight was in the morning so we needed to be up before 6 am and because of the sad goodbyes. We wanted the kids to leave happy, and not sad and not really wanting to leave. Sure, the night was gloomy, but everyone woke up and boarded the plane happy and excited, which is what we wanted. Goal achieved.
Last time (in 2014) we left Brazil, José had a fever because that’s how he externalizes his sadness. It was NOT a good flight for us, and it was even worse for him. Plus, all of the other kids were super grumpy and gloomy and uncooperative. It wasn’t something we wanted to experience again.

Bye, Brazil!

But the most important part of our Brazil trip was the people. Our friends and family, you made it. Yes, it was hard at times, but we thank you all dearly for all the time and everything else you spent with and on us.

Thank you, Brazil, for having us! We’ll see you soon!

SaveSaveSaveSave