Ilha Grande Weekend

AMAZING. It was absolute paradise in every possible way. I had no obligations, no rules, and nothing but good food and beaches. We took a ferry from Angra dos Reis to the island and when we arrived we were right away greeted with a warm welcoming. This town was small, but keen for traveling tourists. There were a lot of locals staying for the weekend because on the weekends they all enjoy hanging out on the island. I felt like I had been living on this island for weeks because after a few hours I was saying hey to everyone as if I had known them for ages. They were always saying hello and trying to guide us to the best attractions around the island. We got really lucky with the hotel because one of the owners told us the wrong price in the email, so therefore we got it much cheaper due to his mistake. If you looked at the pictures from the website in my last blog that is exactly what the hotel looked like… a picture out of paradise. There were a lot of hammocks in which I took advantage of when I was reading my book one night. There was a big bungalow for relaxing under the trees. Every morning the breakfast was free from 8-10 and we felt like we were royalty. None of us have had that big of a breakfast since we have been in Brazil, so it was nice to choose from an arrangement of fruits, cakes, and breads. There was tea and coffee provided for the guests all day long including cake and biscuits. I am already missing the tea and coffee breaks that we would have. The people working the hotel all enjoyed our company and we spent a good amount of time at the restaurant that they worked at. We could order room service whenever we wanted and they probably thought we were feeding a bus full of people with the amount of food we ate.

Indi and I are both currently learning Portuguese in our own ways and they were all pretty excited about that. They loved that I was trying to speak the language and every time I said something incorrectly they would immediately correct me because they wanted me to learn it too. We even had two of the locals say that it was surprising that we were trying to learn Portuguese because it is not that common. Since Ilha Grande is a tourist attraction, not many people care to understand the language and just come there for the vacation. It was nice to get recognized for our efforts and prove the tourist vibe wrong. Since I am American I always get the biggest reaction as if they can hardly believe an American is trying to learn a language, when in reality I knew the most out of us three. Anytime we were buying something or trying to speak to someone who did not know English, both Marita and Indi looked at me for translating. The people respected me a lot for this and it made me feel good that I was the go to girl for communicating. As soon as we tell them where we are all from, their reaction is always the same, as if out of all of us I am the most unlikely candidate to be learning the language. I never got tired of the reaction; I just took a great satisfaction in proving the stereotype wrong J. In all honesty though, can you blame them for their reactions?! My whole perspective has changed now that I have walked in the shoes of others outside of the bubble.

The cool thing about this island was that there were so many different travelers. I met so many people just because they are all traveling and every person had a story. There were other group travelers as well as individual travelers. I admire the individual travelers a lot because they are relying solely on the interactions with others and themselves. I want to backpack around by myself one day… but then I realize I am a girl and I would rather backpack with someone. Anyways, we met people from England, Germany, France, and more. We hung out with someone different each night and it was awesome to meet people from so many different places.

The beaches… relaxing. The first day we decided to go for a walk and ended up meeting new people who had a boat, so they took us to a waterfall. It was a long hike, but once we got there it was awesome and I could not resist getting into the water since it was so hot. The second day we hiked to a beach that was somewhat close and it was secluded because not many people knew about it. The third day was the best of them all. This beach was absolutely amazing and I could not have been more relaxed. We took a boat to another part of the island and from there we had a 20 minute hike to this beach. The water was muito azul and the sun was perfect this weekend. I was the only one that got into the water all weekend (I had to force myself to relax and not be adventurous), so I decided to be a little adventurer on my own in the ocean. Dumb. There were a bunch of rocks close to the ocean; the waves were not super intense, but not mild. In my head I thought ‘wow what a good idea to swim over there and climb on the rocks’. Well it wasn’t until I got closer to the rocks where I decided that it was not a good idea. This might sound bad, but it was honestly hilarious. I underestimated the strength of the ocean and realized no matter how hard I swam I stayed in the same spot as the ocean was playing tug of war with me towards the rocks. What was supposed to be a casual swim turned into the most painful workout that I probably needed actually. After swimming my little heart out and letting the waves crash down on me, I finally made it to the shallow end. I just started laughing at myself because, not going to lie; I did have a moment of panic while I was swimming thinking ‘what if I crashed into a rock’. I could not help but to laugh because it was such a dumb idea that it was funny. My legs and arms were dead and I had no trouble relaxing after that. I got some sun, so I am on my way to blending in with the Brazilians (exaggeration).

Paradise does have its consequences… I may need to start running more to catch up to the amount of food I ate. But it was so worth it. Ilha Grande was nothing more than pure relaxation, it was a nice getaway, but it’s good to be back : ]

Angra Dos Reis:

Lauren, the girl below, was such a nice person! From England. Chocolate (yes, that is his name, but we called him Nutella) is a local that was also nice!

Hotel: Pousada Dos Meros

Ilha Grande:

Yes, I am one of the little pebbles at the top of the waterfall below: