It's Bad Manners to Keep A Vacation Waiting

I'm going to go ahead and blame my love of the beach on living so close to Mentor Headlands and going there every summer (and fall and winter and spring) for as long as I can remember. In happy times and in sad times, I have always escaped to Mentor Headlands. I've slowly moved farther and farther away from my beloved beach, but have definitely projected my love for Headlands onto other beaches. 

1992, 1993, 1994, and 2014. Some things never change.

Being at a beach, any beach, instantly lifts my mood. So when talk of heading back to Ilha Grande was going around, I wasn't about to say no. I would have gone hungry for a week if that's what it took to save money to go there for a weekend. It didn't, but I would have.

The many faces of me at the beach. #shamelessselfies

I love the feel of Ilha Grande. There are no cars, so time seems to move so much slower. There are restaurants lining the beach with their tables placed right in the sand. Boats are constantly pulling up to shore to drop people off or take them to another beach. Everyone is always slightly sunburnt, barefoot, and wearing a bathing suit. Everything and everyone seems so much more relaxed. And its awesome. 

We joined the sunburnt, barefoot, bathing suit clad community for entire weekend of boat riding and beach hopping. I honestly don't think there is a better way to spend a weekend. Heaven will be like Ilha Grande, I have no doubt.

As Matt, Maggie, and I on our Spring Break Adventure, we used Easy Transfer to get to the island. I could live without the 7am pick-up, but it does get us to the island around 1:30pm. Which is plenty of time for apple cinnamon crepes, sunbathing on the beach, and caipirinhas in the sand. It's also enough time to book a full island tour for the following day, but then be told that the tour is off (and then back on) at least three times.

Our entire night of praying/ begging for weather perfect for a full island tour must have paid off because on Sunday morning, we boarded a speed boat to take us around the island. Over the course of the day we stopped at Lopes Mendes and Dois Rios (just to look at from afar) and Caxadaço, Parnaioca, Aventureiro, Meros, and Manguariquessaba (for swimming and other shenanigans.) It was an awesome day. 

In Caxadaço, we jumped off baby cliffs. Which, in retrospect, weren't that high at all. In Parnaioca, we walked to a fake waterfall which was really just a river with some small rocks in it-- let down. In Aventureiro, we saw the horizontal growing palm tree and scaled a giant boulder for awesome 360 views of the beach. Terrifying, but awesome. In Meros, we stayed in the boat because the sun went behind the clouds and we were cold. Plus we had caipirinhas to drink. And, finally, in Manguariquessaba, we saw a real live sea turtle in the wild. My life is now complete.

L to R: Caxadaço, Parnaioca, Aventureiro, Mero, and Manguariquessaba

I know, right. I live in a real life screen saver. 

And since we can sleep when we are dead, we were up nice and early on Monday for another boat tour. This time to Lagoa Azul for a little snorkeling action. We made a couple of stops before arriving in Lagoa Azul, but again, the sun was nowhere to be seen and we were cold so we stayed on the boat. #gringalife 

Snorkeling was a huge hit-- fish by the hundreds. As well as countless jumps off the boat because we could and more selfies that I'm comfortable with admitting. We also got cake because someone else on our boat was celebrating their birthday (thanks, stranger) and then saw dolphins swimming through the waves created by our boat. Seriously, how is this my life? How is this a casual weekend of life in Rio? HOW?!

And to round out our weekend, our two and a half hour trip home became a seven hour trip home because everyone else in Rio was heading back after a long week and the traffic was atrocious. It was the only blemish on an otherwise perfect weekend.

See the little red dots before the green pin? It took us almost three hours to drive that far. 

Ilha Grande (or "Grand Island" as my phone so appropriately calls it) may not be Mentor Headlands, but it rejuvenates my soul in the same way. And I didn't even have to go hungry the week prior to get there.

Spring Break Part 1/2: Adventure is Out There in Ilha Grande

After days and days of waiting, it finally arrived. Spring Break 2015 was FINALLY here!

We traveled from Rio de Janeiro to Ilha Grande using Easy Transfer. As the name suggests, it really was easy. They picked us up at our villa and drove us to the dock where we boarded the ferry to Ilha Grande. It was about a 2-3 hour drive and we stopped once on the way there. They did the same for returning us back to Rio de Janeiro from Paraty. It was great to have all our own transportation covered for us (for a flat fee) where we knew we wouldn't be getting ripped off or getting in a car with someone who is not trustworthy. For people who don't speak Portuguese, this is a huge bonus.

Upon arriving in Ilha Grande, we stayed at El Misti Hostel. Apparently El Misti is a chain of hostels throughout South America and plenty of people have stayed in them and loved it. This was not the case with us. The hostel had two locations on the island and we were given a shared room with a shared bathroom in the junkier hostel. Despite the fact that we paid for a private room with a private bathroom. The WiFi didn't work (okay, we were on vacation, no big deal), they didn't give us a key to our room at first (nor were lockers provided), the mattresses were the color of dirt and the sheets didn't stay on the mattresses. The island was awesome, the hostel was not.

While in Ilha Grande, we decided that we would each choose one activity for everyone to do. That way there was no fighting and we were all happy. 

My pick: I had read that Praia Lopes Mendes is one of the most beautiful beaches in Brazil., so we had to go. On the day that we arrived, we took a water taxi to the beach and then had to hike for 20 minutes or so before arriving there. Was it beautiful? Absolutely. Would I say that it's one of the best beaches in Brazil? I don't know. It was more like a typical beach in the States with plenty of room to participate in beach activities (sunbathing, soccer, frescoball, etc). But the water was really wavy on the day that we went, so it wasn't great for swimming.

Maggie's pick: On our first full day in Ilha Grande we went on a "meia volta". Which translates to a half island tour. We boarded a speed boat with Prime Tours from Vila do Abraão and from there stopped at 5-6 different beaches. I wish that I could remember them all, but I really cannot. I can tell you that we saw dolphins first thing in the morning on the way to Lagoa Verde, that we saw a starfish that was huge, that we also saw some gross underwater snake/ eel thing, and that I swam with more fish that I had ever thought possible. I also sat on our boat, waved my hand, and a man selling Popsicles on a different boat came alongside ours so that I could purchase what I wanted. Talk about service. I didn't even really want a popsicle at that moment, but I really wanted a Popsicle sold to me off of a boat.

Matt's pick: Sunrise hike up Pico do Papagaio. It was as awful and as awesome as it sounds. We started the hike at 2:30am and proceeded to hike up 980+ km up for a 7.5 hour, 10 mile round trip hike. Throughout which I cried and almost threw up on myself more than once. It was the most physically demanding thing I have ever had to do. But, I did it. We hiked with Martin, from Prime Tours (again), and it was one of the best decisions I have ever made. He's an awesome person and an awesome guide.

We rounded out our time in Ilha Grande with some kilo ice cream and a day at the beach in Abraão. And, of course, one last night in our gross, mosquito infested hostel where I'm pretty sure monkeys were doing samba on the roof all night, every night because there is nothing else that could have been making that much racket.

After 2.5 beautiful days in paradise-- we were off to Paraty!