We drove around various parts of the city to head to the Independence Park Museum and Palace. Built in 1890, this palace was one of the earliest monuments to the independence of Brazil. We had actually driven by this place in the past a couple of times on lost cab rides trying to get to work - at least we had seen the main military bronze monument (built in 1921) at one end of the surrounding park before. Brazil declared its independence from Portugal in 1822. This place is now a Sao Paulo history museum and was fun to venture around. We were not allowed to take photos inside, but got some outside on and the ground surrounding. See the photo link at the bottom of this post.
From there, we drove into the heart of downtown, looking at a lot of interesting buildings and parts of the city. Lots of traffic, lots of people out for the day. We saw the Municipal Theater, modeled after the Paris Opera. This place opened Sept. 12, 1911. There is a picture in the photo album. Some things new, many things old. Then it was testosterone time! The driver knew I was a motorcycle junkie and he took me through the "motorcycle section" of town. A long couple of blocks of motorcycle shops, one after another. And a gazillion bikes parked and moving about. My kind of place!
A funny thing about the downtown area is you have all of these specialty shopping areas. We have seen many. I just talked about the motorcycle area, but we have seen many others. We saw one area that was a couple of blocks selling nothing but mannequins! And another section that was all bridal wear - store after store, lined up side by side! And an electronics section that is only rivaled by the Ahikabara area in Tokyo!
We commented we had never seen a cemetery nor a firetruck / fire station in all of our travels around the area. Today we saw both. The cemetery (see photo link) very much reminded me of the Catholic influence of the area.
The fire station boys were very talkative to an American. My driver told him I was a fireman from Colorado that rode motorbikes. We talked a long time, very friendly people. The fireman let me sit on his bike for a photo.
They use the motos as an advance team for a call to see if they really need to bring out the heavy gear and big ladder trucks. With the traffic like it is as well as the narrow, twisty streets everywhere, I cannot imagine trying to navigate a regular fire truck around. All of the buildings and houses are made of bricks and concrete anyway, so they probably don't see much action.
Then we headed to the central train and subway station building, the Estacao da Luz, built in 1901. The central vaulted area covers 4 tracks. Again, you can see this in the photo album. This is a neat old building that sees lots of action. It was interesting to hear that the trains are not national as the states in Brazil use different gauges - some narrow, others "standard". There is an effort to change this in place within the country, but that is about 5 years down the line.
From here, we drove around to a more modern area of town, the Paulista district. We stopped at this very old coffee plantation home preserved in the middle of the financial district. This was a neat old stone home surrounded by some splendid gardens.
On our way back, we stopped for a photo op at the Monumeto as Bandeiras. Completed in 1950, this tribute to the explorers who opened up Brazil's interior. Photo in the album.
We finished up with a nice lunch in the Italian district.
There are a couple of "different" aspects about men's restrooms down here. One is you frequently find tissue dispensers just above the urinals. Can't touch anything dirty, now can we? Another oddity is that in nice places to eat, there are ice cubes in the urinals. Today, there were Mentos down there - keeps things smelling fresh. Different strokes for different folks.
We safely arrived back to our hotel around 4 in the afternoon, ready for a nap! Thanks for reading.
Here is the link to my photos, starting with a couple from last trip before venturing into today's trip.
Click Here!
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