Weekend in Paraty

Today is Fred's birthday (Parabens, Benzinho!) so we went to Paraty last weekend to celebrate. Paraty is a quaint and incredibly charming fishing town about 4 hours from Rio. Yes, it's a hike
but the drive is so amazingly beautiful that it only adds to the pleasure of the trip. A highlight for me was re-learning how to drive a stick shift after 12 years- props to Fred for not having a heart attack during the first hour of my driving! We stayed at a pousada that Dana and I had stayed at last year when we were here - check it out at http://www.urquijo.com.br. And of course, I made friends with the local cat, Violeta.

Aside from eating tons of amazing seafood (which is what Paraty is known for...obviously. It's a fishing town) we rented a boat for the day on Saturday and went island hopping. Our captain was a friendly, if not annoyingly talkative, chap who gave us the history of Paraty and it's surrounding islands throughout the ride. We were lucky enough to see an endangered monkey, the Titi Leon Dorado, which was one of the most beautiful animals I've ever seen. The picture does not do it justice, but it has this gorgeous yellow-orange coat with a black tail and a mane like a lion. On Saturday night while meandering the cobblestone streets, we happened upon a capoeira show...and I fell in love. If you have never seen capoeira, please put it on your to-do-immediately list. Believe it or not, you can actually find it in NYC. It's like the Tae-Kwon-Do of Brazil - every kid takes capoeira lessons at some point. It's a playful, beautiful, graceful sport and I was in awe, especially when HUGE men got out onto the floor and turned into graceful, fluid dancers. I'll post a video so you can see for yourselves...

Sunday was rainy, so we walked around town a bit and then went to the local beach. Fred taught me how to play Fresco Ball, which is a beach game involving a ball and 2 wooden paddles. Strangely enough, there seemed to be a large hole in my paddle, and the ball kept going through it! The weirdest part about this is that in high school, when I took tennis with Ms. Hill in Phys-Ed, my tennis racquet also had a hole in it!! I guess I just have bad luck with racquet sports... :)

And we headed back to Rio on Sunday night (this time with me driving much, much better...)