The Ultimate Travel Guide :
The Ultimate Travel Guide For Brazil is here by Diana Wittkowski.
Colorful, huge, wonderful. If you want to visit Brazil, take as much time as you want but plan ahead where you want to go. Don’t fool yourself believing that you’ll drive from one corner to another within a few hours and don’t think that the time predicted by your GPS will be accurate. Do you want to give it a try? Check the way from the northernmost to the southernmost cities in Brazil: Uiramutã to Chuí.
7,500 km coastline of amazing beaches, warm Atlantic waters and fine sand under your feet. The Amazon Forest, Cerrado, Atlantic Forest, Caatinga, Pampas, Pantanal. A huge biodiversity and vast wildlife, exotic plants and animals.
Great metropolises, modern architecture, innovating urban solutions, small improvised villages and preserved historical areas. Amazing food, wonderful music, dance, and art.
Our summer is warm and long, but during winter we can have rainy weather in the north (where evening appointments are often scheduled “after the rain”) or cold in the south (very cold indeed, in fact, some regions have snow).
To have a better overview, let’s go through the 5 Brazilian regions:
North
Impressive, green and with rainforests and vast wildlife. I would definitely recommend every person to have such an experience, having a bit of a feeling of nature, its power and how it is being handled.
The access into the green areas is not easy and you’ll need as much support and information as possible. In the very north of Brazil, between Venezuela and Guyana, you can reach Monte Roraima.
LDo you want to see deep in nature and have a great adventure? The Tepui, as Roraima Mount called by its indigenous inhabitants, has its own microclimate, in the middle of a savanna going up over 2,000m high. Hiking it up you’ll see the vegetation changing, until reaching the peak (the largest in the world with 50km2) where the periods of drought are protected by condensed clouds.
Untouched for almost 2 million years, flora and fauna thrived without external influence. Be prepared to see what you can’t find anywhere else in this world. At the Top of Cucuy Rock is the border between Brazil, Venezuela and Guyana, a rare way to stipulate country limits.
Northeast
A wonderful coast with deep blue waters, white clear fine sand, and palms decorating it and endless coconut water to refresh you. Clichés aside, in the countryside you’ll also find amazing landscapes and strong popular cultures.
Here is where the European arrived in the year 1.500, so you can picture the impact of a Catholic European colonization merging with locals and dyed with African culture, forbidden and hidden for a while, but still intense. Very colorful garments, and souls, houses and dishes, that’s the heart of our colourful country.
Don’t miss the opportunity to try the spices and the myriad of fruits there. The fresh pressed juices are just the best you can have. Enjoy Acarajé, take a good bloco de rua and dance your soul out. A secret tip? If you inform yourself in advance, you’ll find less touristic places and so enjoy nature and its calm atmosphere in the coming and going of waves, warm sun and fresh wind on your skin. Special spot?
The amazing landscape from Lençóis Maranhenses. White dunes bathed in blue-green water lagoons; these 9,0000 acres of unique beauty hosts 133 plant species, 112 bird and over 40 reptile species.
Central-West
For those interested in architecture and urbanism the capital of Brazil, Brasília, is definitely an invaluable visit. The biggest city built in the 20th century was completely planned from scratch. The region is very dry keeping it not inhabited, which enabled the design of the ideal conceptual city.
From above you see an airplane form, where you recognize the main axis with the whole administrative structure and 2 residential wings, A and B, surrounded by the artificial lake Paranoá, responsible for lowering the high temperatures. The administrative axis and residential areas are filed with modern architecture and bestows us with wonderful renowned projects. Another treasure of this region, between many beauties, is the Pantanal, a section of Amazon rainforest.
Depending on the period, you will enjoy different views of nature and animal species. This is one of the largest flood plains on this planet, with 210,000 km², an absolutely wonderful biodiversity where you can see cuttings of Amazon Forest, Caatinga, Cerrado and waterholes inhabited by over a thousand animal species – including the jaguar.
Due to the growing tourism in this region, you’ll find a comfortable and secure way to explore and explore this area with eco tourism; there are farm hotels where you can sleep, enjoy great food and tours.
Southeast
industrialized and populated region in the country. There is also a region with a lot of history. Rio de Janeiro remained the capital of Brazil, after Salvador, until Brasília was built. The neighbor state, Minas Gerais, had an important leadership in the gold commerce, and it’s a Brazilian baroque architecture paradise, as usual, surrounded by vast nature.
Shall I call Rio de Janeiro the business card of the Brazilian tourism? Parks, beaches, mountains, museums, historical areas, good food, great music, street life, stages. Doesn’t it sound a lot like Brazil? Rio is just fantastic and feels mostly “like as eye drops for your sight”*.
In The South we have the state of São Paulo with a population of almost 46 million people. It is the economic center of the country, filled with culture, nature, leisure, events and spectacular nature.
South
Last but not least, the South, where I spent 20 years and still consider my home. The Brazilian south offers natural wonders with a subtropical climate (Can you think of snow in Brazil? Yes, we have it here!), the Atlantic Forest and Araucária Forests. In this region you can visit many cute historical cities and perceive the European influence.
Here I can mention the “Serra do Rio do Rastro” where you can drive in one of the most amazing roads of this world, in a mountain range surrounded by deep cliffs and amazing landscapes. If you reach the 1.440m high during winter, you can look for a cozy German home and, with a pinch of good luck, wait for the snow while eating Cuca and drinking some spicy hot chocolate.
On sunny clear days you can even see the Atlantic ocean, 100km from the mountains. Santa Catarina has a colder climate but still amazing beaches. All nature itself, astonishing lakes, mountains and dunes. All the capitals here are big cities with considerable structure and a lot of cultural life. One of my favorite places is another mountain range, the “Serra da Graciosa”.
It’s also an interesting task to drive along it, the old road connecting the capital of Paraná, Curitiba, to a very cute historical city, Morretes. and the Atlantic coast. Be prepared for fantastic food and a wonderful landscape after the ride through the beauties of the densest forest in the world, our Atlantic forest.
Ufa, it is a hard task summarizing it in a few paragraphs. But even being a huge country all Brazilians speak the same language, Portuguese. The melody may change, some slang appears here and there, but the language is the same; from north to south we understand each other perfectly. It is not exactly the same with English so maybe you could bring some survival vocabulary in your pocket like
onde -where,
banheiro -toilet,
comida -food
estrada -road
por favor -please
obrigada – thank you.
Respect cultures, people and nature, but be careful: be aware of where you are going, and avoid being alone, criminality is unfortunately a very problem in this country. Don’t forget sunscreen and repellent as well.
* A Brazilian idiom which means something is very beautiful
(PT: colírio para os olhos)
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