A Big Weekend - Mountains and Japanese Sao Paulo

We covered a lot of ground over the weekend and it was all good, with the exception of a traffic jam last night. But one thing I forgot to mention earlier in the week. Wednesday, while driving down this 10 lane freeway at a grand speed of 20 KPH, we look off to the side of the road to see a couch sitting upright, as it should be, right beside the road, in full flame. I mean, this bad boy had been carefully placed by the highway and torched. And nobody seemed to care one bit. Everyone was driving along in the frenzie, paying no mind, and no fire trucks (which is something I have yet to see down here). Pretty funny.

Yesterday our trusty tour guide took us to Campos do Jordao, which is about 180K north and east of Sao Paulo. This would take us into the mountains - something us Colorado folks have been itching to see. We took off from the hotel at 9AM and hit the road. About an hour later, we stopped for a pit stop in the Brazilian version of "Stuckeys", but the specialty of the house is chicken. The place was packed and it seemed to be a good spot for the moto-tourists to take a break as well. On the freeway, I got to see lots of nice, fast sport bikes, still lane-splitting, when needed, at 120 KPH.



We returned to the road and soon started climbing up into the mountains. I had to keep reminding myself that I am in the tropics and north of the Tropic of Capricorn, so this mountain excursion will not remind me of Colorado. The ride up was beautiful, even if our driver was driving the Chevy minivan like a sports car. We stopped at a roadside overlook just short of our destination for some photos and a taste of sugar cane juice. Very nice, but super sweet.

Next we arrived in Campos, which is this German / Swiss town for the wealthy. The architecture is very German and Swiss, up in the mountains, lush green everywhere.



We drove through town and then stayed on the road to climb higher up, eventually reaching the "end of the road" at the highest point of our trip - 2035M or 6766 feet. It cooled down to the mid-80s temperature wise, a welcome relief. Looked at many places in the country, including some really big, but very beautiful hotels built on the side of mountains with distinctive German architecture. There are lots of photos in the photo album that accompanies this blog. Back to town for lunch and the German influence was everywhere.



Enjoyed some fine food and very good Brazilian brewed German beer. I thought I had returned to Munich when the glass of suds arrived. We walked around a bit - the place was beautiful, full of people and full of life. I spotted a couple of my beloved BMW motorcycles parked up here - which really warmed my heart. Don't see many German bikes in Brazil, but found this sticker on a 1200GS as a positive sign they are here somewhere...



We had a great afternoon hanging out at the sidewalk cafe, enjoying good food, good friends, and good beer. The street entertainment was awesome as well. The cafe where we dined had a guy playing Beatles tunes on a Sax and he was good. In the street was a mime with a outfit that made it look like he was riding a horse. He was a hoot to watch as he harassed motorcycle riders, slowed traffic, and made everyone laugh.

Finally had to head back to Sao Paulo. Just as we arrived in the city, we encountered stand still traffic for 2+ hours. What a let down to such an exciting day. Finally got to the hotel almost 12 hours after we started.

Today, Sunday, was a sleep in day. Arose to some nice Brazilian coffee, a good time with my Sword, followed by a steamy run in the nearby park. Cleaned up, had a good breakfast and it was time to head to Liberdade, the Japanese community in Sao Paulo.



The Japanese community here is 2nd only to Japan itself. Today is market day down there and the place was crazy-packed with people and booths. It was sunny and very hot. It is also called the hippy market and we could see why: lots of beads, incense, macrame for sale as well as typical 70s hand made "stuff". But a lot of Japanese influence in some of the things being sold also. We had lunch in a Chinese / Japanese buffet. When you can't read nor speak the lingo, buffets are the way to go. You walk in, grab a plate, fill 'er up, pay by the weight of your plate. I needed a beer and was rewarded!

Enough for now. Many new picture have been added. Start about midway through, if you have already seen the ones from the last trip.

I am still trying to figure how to make this a linky so you don't have to cut-n-paste, but Blogger is baffling me...

Here are the pictures

Again, thanks for reading and the emails of encouragement. Get to head back to Colorado next Friday for almost 10 days. Then round 3...