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It's a huge country. From top to bottom is further than London to Moscow. The city of Sao Paulo is possibly the 2nd biggest in the world (17million) after Tokyo (30million). Apparently crime is quite bad - Due to car jacking they changed the law so you can proceed through red traffic lights with caution. Which would be fine except they forget the 'caution' bit...

Days 160-164: Natal

After 40 hours of sitting on 4 planes and calling at 8 airports, we made it from the Galapagos Islands to the top corner of Brazil. The journey wouldn't have been too bad, but every Brazilian who sat next to me seemed to have mucus-related distress and no tissues...

We got a cheap hotel (£9 a night) but it was above the world's loudest bar and it flooded when it rained. Luckily my rucksack was on the floor to soak up the flooding... The humidity was practically 100% so nothing dried, which wasn't good as my clothes started to rot and I got trenchfoot from my continuously wet sandals (well, it may not have actually been trenchfoot...)

We got the local bus to a dream-beach place called Praia de Pipa where there's usually dolphins and sun. Instead we saw only beach beetles and it rained.

One night we forgot to lock the door and was woken at 4am by somebody in the room. They had a large axe which they swung at us in the bed, but luckily they missed. Only kidding! They left after standing there for what seemed like ages, saying something random in Portuguese. Not very pleasant.

We came to Natal because its the self-proclaimed beach buggy capital of the world and they do day long trips to the sand dunes... or so we thought! It turned out to be a tour of his mates bars and other things we weren't interested in, with maybe 60 mins of fun in the dunes spread throughout the day. It was made OK by the river crossing aboard a balsa wood raft in a storm (right pic), and coming across a 4x4 which had got stuck in the sea... (above pic)

Days 165-168: The Pantanal
Below the Amazon area, there's the largest inland wetland on earth - a giant swamp area that covers half the size of france. It's densely packed with animals (because there's not many humans there!) When trying to decide whether to go there or go deeper into the jungle, I asked a few tour companys what the chances were of seeing an anaconda - the worlds biggest snake. One replied "100%",

the other said "ooo, they're very rare". I foolishly believed the 100% guy and booked with them. The pressure was now on them, so what the company did was offer a £15 reward to all the locals for anyone who could catch one for us! The day we arrived, one of the local fishermen found a 15ft (3.5m) one. (The guide later confessed he hadnt seen one in months and we were really lucky to see one!)

When you held it, it felt really muscular and warm, with loose skin. Like a warm bar of soap inside a plastic bag... Absolutely fabulous.

On the plus side, we had plenty of wildlife close by. In the shack we slept in actually! Our shower was home to 3 frogs and a cane toad, and one night a large bat found it's way in through the roof and spent 5 mins flying round while we cowered in the bed in the dark (no electricity after 10pm) wondering what to do about it. What do you do with a bat in your room? The cub scouts never did teach me that...
Luckily it found it's own way out the moment I dared get up to discuss the options with it.

The bird life was amazing. Everywhere you looked were birds that you only see in zoos and books.

After the anaconda, the next best thing to spot is a jaguar. Unfortunately the best we got were some 3 hr old footprints (right). We did however see an ocelot (smaller version) but it scampered off before I got a photo.

Hover for actual jaguar pic
(from santiago zoo!) ->

Monkeys were rare so we were very lucky to see some howler monkeys up close - we got under the tree they were in, only to find their favourite defence is to piss and shit on you! So we left sharpish...

Capybara were common (ginormous rat things)

The river was full of pirahnas which you can catch very easily. However after pulling in two fish, both with the hook through their eye, I remembered why I hate fishing. It's because it's cruel and pointless. And anyone who goes fishing is cruel and pointless too, and I'd like to put a hook through fishermens faces and drag them through a lake...

To eat, they are a bit boney and don't have much meat on them, but they do have really cool (and razor sharp!) serrated teeth. (pirahnas, not fishermen!)

Dead animals make food for vultures. We came across a dead calf, a dead caiman and a dead horse, all of which smelt the same...

Days 169-170: Bonito
One of only two towns in the Pantanal region, Bonito has some beautiful natural sights. There are natural warm

Day 171-172: Iguacu falls
Forget Niagara & Victoria falls, this is the undisputed world's biggest and best waterfall.

Day 173 -
Helicopter flight & Bird park

Helicopter flights over the falls are great, except :
1) they only last for 10mins,
2) they don't let you have a go at flying it,
3) they make you fear your Visa bill,
4) they make you realise how revolting a fat smelly American can be.

Then we went to a really cool bird-zoo where the birds live in giant aviarys which you could walk in. They also had over-friendly butterflys...

Day 174-177: Ilha Grande

An island paradise off the coast of Rio.

We went SCUBA diving (bargain - £25 for a days trip including 2 dives) and went to the wrecks of a ship and a helicopter. Saw one of those really cool clams that swims by clapping and shooting a jet of water backwards.

*For those that aren't fellow surfing professionals that translates to "spent an hour drinking seawater, and getting a really sore chest while realising it's actually impossible to surf. Those that appear to be doing it are using smoke and mirrors..."

However the pain of my chest was nothing compared to our mate Kevin, who managed to get a jellyfish or similar down his shorts...!

Day 178: Rio
Hang gliding

This would have been more fun had we not had the extra weight of the pilot. Superfluous. And he wouldn't even do a loop...

The take off was the most exciting part, where you run down a wooden ramp that pokes over the cliff edge. Tripping at the end of the ramp would not have been good.

Sugar loaf mountain

It's a big blob of rock with a cable car going up it. There's a great view of Rio and after 6 months and 17,000 pictures I finally read the camera instructions

so I can now use the manual setting to take OK night time shots.

Day 179: Favela (shanty town) tour

20% of Rios 7 million people live in these rambling unofficial communities. They have no offical addresses and they steal water and electricity by tapping into the mains wires/pipes that run along a nearby proper road.

Within each favela there is one drug baron who controls the drugs supply and security of the area. People who cause trouble for him get shot by one of his mob. Supposedly, because of this harsh 'policing' there's no 'minor' crime within the community. However we did see someone being chased from a shop with a baseball bat...

It's rare for barons to be over 30 years old as they eventually get arrested or shot by police or rivals (more likely!). When they walk around, the mob takes an arsenal of guns and grenades out with them.

The day before we went there had been a shoot-out between the mob and the police. However, only innocent bystanders got shot! One dead and three wounded.

Day 180 - Big statue thing

Built in the 1930's, it's a giant statue on a hill. Impressive in size, but nothing more exciting than that.

And now on to Canada, via stopover in Miami. Total journey time 24 hours.

Next country - Canada