Sloth

It wasn't just coatis that were at home amongst the throngs of tourists. This sloth was in one of the busiest areas.

Coatis

After travelling across brazil & only seeing 3 coatis, we couldn't believe that at a busy tourist spot like JC on the hill, would be home to a huge family of the busy little critters. They were so brazen! I made sure I kept my distance.

Three of the youngsters even decided to have a play fight right in fronts of us.

The View From Above

Far more interesting than the huge statue was the view from its feet. We could see across the entire city, the bay it surrounds, the Atlantic Ocean, and Sugar Loaf rock amongst other sights.

Christ the Redeemer

If you haven't seen footage of this huge statue, you've been living under a serious rock. It's very popular with the tourist set & we were far from alone. The statue can bee seen from almost anywhere in the city & with good reason. It's on about the highest point in the area.

Off to Rio

We left the boat at Mangro and waited for a little while for our van. It turns out that the van wasn't big enough for the whole lot of us so an extra taxi (of sorts) showed up as well. Most of the group rushed to get in the van which was a bit cramped by the time they all pile in. Kerri, Nic & myself took the car option & it was a good one. Plenty of space & comfy seats.

The trip wasn't especially interesting & about the only thing of interest (and I use the term loosely) was this train. As you can expect, not much to say. It's a train.

I guess it took a couple of hours to get to the hotel in Rio de Janeiro. The hotel situation was a disaster! Most of the rooms weren't ready even though it was well past check in time. Our room was ready but one of the two single beds had the hardest mattress I've ever sat on! No jokes, it was more like a table! We complained because we weren't about to put up with it for the last 3 nights of out holiday (and it would have been me sleeping on it). They found us a different room but they made it difficult for us.

We signed ourselves up for a city tour that afternoon because it looked like it would be the best weather for the next few days. It would take us to most of the big tourist spots/traps around Rio.

Out of place

I spotted this otter close to the mainland. I don't know which species it is because the research I've done tells me there shouldn't be otters in the ocean in that area. I think it could be one of the endangered sea going otters that are normally off the Argentina coast.

Time To Leave

Day 45 - Travel to Rio de Janeiro

Unfortunately we had to leave Ilha Grande some time. The younger members of the group had gone on a booze cruise to one of the small islands the night beofre & weren't too interested in anything except sleeping. Guess which ones they were.... We all piled onto a small boat for the trip back to the mainland. We wouldn't go back to Angra this time but would instead head slightly north east to Mangro.

Just Desserts

Pictured is the odd looking peak that overlooks Abrao. It reminds me of the once volcanic plugs of the Glasshouse Mountains north of Brisbane (QLD, Australia).

After such a big day of exercise we were tired & very hungry. We got a quick meal at a place around the corner from the hotel. We figured that with all the exercise we were entitled to raid a desert cart. Desert carts are a Brazilian thing. They load up a small cart (usually attached to a half bicycle) with cakes & a seemingly endless array of deserts. The vendors park themselves somewhere prominent & do a roaring trade. I was still hungry after that & hit the ice cream shop. We hadn't gone near the scarce ice cream opportunities available during the trip because of the digestional risks involved with dairy in Peru & Bolivia. It was good ice cream too!

It took no time to fall asleep after such a big day.

Circling Birds

We made it back to Abrao after a leisurely 50 min cruise from Enseada Palmas. At times we were shadowed by Frigate birds amongst others. During most of the day you could see hundreds of them circling above the island with the vultures. They looked like a swarm of insects (see photo below).

Squirrel

This was not the animal I'd expected to see in the South American Jungle near a troupe of Tamarin Monkeys. Apparently squirrels are as much at home in Brazil as they are in Canada & the US. So many times on the trip the knowledge I thought I had about animals of the world was challenged & proven way off.

Common Marmosets

We (Kerri, Nic & I) decided we should leave Lopez Mendes or we would have been walking the whole 3-1/2 hours back to Abrao (in the dark for the most part). We had to meet a boat at Enseada das Palmas on the other side of the last ridge. Corina & Sandra and the late arrivers decided to stay for a bit to do some sun worshiping.

Just after we left the beach, I heard a chirp that wasn't familiar to me & didn't sound like a bird. Kerri & Nic kept going but I stopped for a while to listen again (I've become quite the wildlife spotter since the Canadian adventure). Sure enough, the trees around me were full of these cute little Common Marmosets. I ran up the track & made Nic & Kerri come back.

We watched this troupe of about 20 Common Marmosets play in the trees around us for around half an hour. They seemed more interested in us that we were of them. They even had a very young one with them, but they took it way up into the top of the tress when we got there. They're only little monkeys with the largest male (pictured left) having a body no more than 8 inches long but have have the most amazingly long stripy tails. Needless to say, there were no shortage of photos.

We totally missed the boat we were targeting but managed to catch the following one.

Brown Gannets

It wasn't just the penguins that had my attention with their fishing exploits. This pair of brown gannets was also busy catching lunch. They were doing the whole spear dive into the water & emerging from the depths with a fish.

Fishing

I took my trusty camera with me onto the rocks (at some risk to the camera mind) to take some shots of the penguins. This one came right up close to the rock & even caught a nice fish right in front of me. Doesn't he look proud of himself? And yes he did swallow that fish that's way bigger that his head although he did struggle with it a bit.

Magellanic Penguins

Here's the culprits I was talking about. They are Magellanic Penguins & we saw 4 of them at Lopez Mendes. They're not quite the same as the Humbolt Penguins we saw on the West coast, but very similar. The also carry Brazillian passports instead of Peruvian.....

They didn't seem at all bothered by our presence & were quite happy going about their business even though we were less than 10m away from them.

Lopez Mendes

3-1/2 hours & 3 steep, slippery climbs after setting off from Abrao, we finally made it to Lopez Mendes. It's quite the nice beach. It nice & wide with fine white sand & clear water.

We donned sunscreen to avoid a repeat performance of the Trinadade sunburn from a couple of days previous. Then we hit the water for some more body surfing. As it turns out, we weren't alone & I don't mean the randoms in board shorts. If you look to the right of the people, you'll see a small head in the water (see the next post to find out the culprit).

There was a group of our travel buddies that were slow off the mark that morning & opted to take the boat around to Enseada Palmas instead of hiking like we did. They arrived not long after we hit the water. It was like a family day at the beach back home.

Enseada Palmas

The trail down the hill was treacherous. It was so steep & slippery. Eventually we made it down to the next small bay around the island from Abrao called Enseada Palmas.

We weren't done yet. We still had a fair way to go. There was another small ridge to scale to the next beach & bay before the climb over the final ridge to Lopez Medes.

Abrao Lookout

Day 44 - Lopez Mendes

Despite some advice against our idea, a small band of us (Sandra, Corina, Nic, Kerri & myself) decided to hike to the big beach on the ocean side of the island (Lopez Mendes).

We set off after breakfast walking past the hostel we'd been to the night before. The trail became quite steep and was very slippery thanks to the wet weather. It was nice walking through the lush rain forest. At the top of the first ridge the trees opened out (I think maybe because of a fire) and we caught this view back to Abrao. We could see all the way back to the mainland.