Sao Paulo again

Tomorrow I will go to Sao Paulo again. I have some more plants that I have to collect from there. I will go together with Chris and my friend Marinawho has her family in Sao Paulo. Chris will go back to campinas the same day, but I'll stay over the weekend.

I will try once again to enter this exhibition with the real bodies. Marina told me that the chances are maybe not very good since we try on a weekend, but you never know until you've tried.. I really hope it will work. It sounds so cool this exhibition!

Sao paulo

An old picture from Sao Paulo.. Why do exercise when you can take the bus..?

The waterfall

Filling up the bottle from this nice waterfall

View 2

And another one

View 1

One of the nice views that we were given after the rather though walk up the mountain..

May flower

This beautiful flower is called may flower..

The christ

Before I went home yesterday I went for a long walk up to the christ. What a view you got from there!! Really cool!

Humming bird

There were humming birds all around the place!

My driver

My personal driver that took me around the city of Rio de Janeiro

Drinking

When there are no waterfalls to fill up your bottle you can just take some of the water that the forest offers to you.. This tree stores its water in the tree trunk..

One part of the orchid group..

beachen

The river

The beautiful river that we were trekking next to

Monkey

These guys were jumping around next to the christ.. They look very funny!

Rio

ok, if the trip to Minas Gereis was nice I don't know what to say about my stay here in Rio. It has been a very nice weekend with a lot of nice experiences. I came to Rio this friday and Rosario was supposed to meet me at the airport. She was a bit late but she showed up after 30 min or so. She's a very nice lady, short with dark curled hair. Then we went to her house which is situated in the mountains in Rio. A very nice house with spectacular views over Rio.

The next day we went up at 5:30 to start the orchid-excursion. We went to pick up some other orchid lovers and went of to the mountains around Petropolis. The views from my last trip was very nice but this was even more incredible. The mountain formations around Rio look so cool! We went to this area that is owned by an english man and it's a protected area of over 6000 hk! We had a guide that took us through the atlantic rainforest and we got really close to the animals. We didn't see any jaguar, but we saw fresh foot prints from it. It would have been soo cool if we got to see one.. But, we saw a lot of orchids. The guys in the group are really experts and spotted the orchids from far distance and namned them without any doubts..

It was a very long walk and we stopped to long by every orchid so on the way back we had to use our torch to find the way back.. We stayed in a small house in the forest. Really nice.

The next day only half of the group was fit to take another walk after the rather long and though walk from yesterday. This walk was well worth taking! We walked up to a very beautiful waterfall and then we walked along the stream down again. This was a real djungel track. The guide had his mascheta in his hand all the time to make a path for us..

Well back at the house the humming birds were flying around the house and you got a really close look at them. Also Nicolas, the owner of the area, was there. A very nice man that invited me again and I have an open invitation to go there and work with his project (replanting and protection of the forest)when ever I want!

So, then we went back to Rio and the next day me and Rosario, who by the way is the director of the orchid magazine Orquidario here in Brazil, and a very powerfull person, went to her orchid green house in Petropolis. It`s a beautiful place and a crazy big green house. Here I sampled my Hoffmannseggella species. There were a lot so it took some time actually.

After this Rosarios dad, Jaocarlo, picked me up to go for lunch at his place. That Rosario was a rather wealthy lady I had already figured out, but now i started to understand how wealthy.. Her dad is very rich and powerful and everybody knowes him. He has several houses around Petropolis and a crazy appartment in Rio etc.. In his house I got a very nice lunch without having to move one finger. They had servents doing everything. Like at an expensive restaurant..

Then I went with Jaocarlo and his new wife (much younger then him..) to there appartment in Rio. A very nice flat with the view over one of the beaches in Rio. Very nice, but for me it felt to much like hotel and not like a home..

ok, then he arranged a personal driver for me that took me around Rio and showed me all the beautuful beaches and took me for a very nice ride in Rio. Then he took me back to Rosarios house, and there a had a nice dinner with some tropical fresh fish!

Today I`ll go back to Campinas at six. I really don`t want to. It`s much, much nicer here then in Campinas... Today I will go for a walk around the neighbour hood here. It`s very nice here and some very nice views over Rio.

Rio

Oi!

Today I will leave to Rio de Janeiro. I need to collect some Hoffmannseggella species that are there. I will meet a women called Rosario. She's an orchid fantast and she will help me collect the species that I need. They are cultivated, so it will not be very hard to find them... On Saturday though we will go for some trekking, an orchid-excursion somewhere around Rio, it sounds really nice!

Probably I'll be back in Campinas on Wednesday again, and then there will be some pics on the blog.. C U!

Excursion

This wednesday I started my trip to the state of Minas Gerais to search for my orchids. It was a very, very nice trip!

Day one. This day we (Chris and me) went all the way to Diamantina. We started at 8 in the morning and arrived at 19:30 in the evening. It was a long ride but the way was truly remarkable. The landscape was soooo beautiful and almost every view was like a picture. We had dinner at a small nice restaurant in town.

Diamantina is an old time and the name comes from the finding of diamants in the region. The whole town has a wonderful atmosphere and it was just great!

Day two. Early in the morning we traveled to the mountain regions around Diamantina equiped with our snake bite protection leggings... Chris search and collect a flower genus called Lycnophyra. Its an asteraceae that looks like small pine. We found alot and I helped him with collecting them. And of course I searched for my Hoffmannseggella orchids to, and I found them. They grow right on the mountains. They dont need any soil to grow... This area was very beautiful with mountaintops and really beautiful views.
In the evening I was soo hungry and felt for a pizza. This was unfortunately a very bad idea. After we went to the pizza place and ordered the pizza Chris told med that in Minas Gerais people can't make good pizza. And it was really, really true. I couldn't finnish it. Just crazy lots of really bad cheese and almost no tomato sause at all. If you ever go to Minas Gerais: Dont eat pizza!!

Day three. This day we went to other regions around Diamantina. We passed the old road that used to take the slaves from Diamantian to another city. The view from there was really spectacular. But the thought of the slaves brings the feeling down a bit.. We found alot of plants for Chris and I searched for a flowering Hoffmannseggella, but no luck. This day we also went to a region with a nice waterfall and I took a refreshing swim. Very nice!!
Well back in Diamantina we went for dinner at a more traditional place. The food is made over an open fire and tastes really good. After dinner we went to another very nice café where I had the best lime cake ever! After this we went for a walk in the city and then there was this super nice evening market with a lot of nice things to by. Some gifts were bought here to you guys at home...

Day four. Of to another city, Serra. Again the way was remarkably beautiful. We passed through this really big nice national park. Chris took some plants from there aswell and I garded to warn him if the police came... In Brazil you can get up to 3 years for collecting plants like tihs in the park, but he needed the species... We saw the sunset from a mountain top and the day was just perfect. In the evening we tried to find a hotel, but they were all rather expensive. We finaly found one. When I went for a shower I had company, a really big hairy spider tried to get away from the water.. I called for Chris and he told me it was really poisonous and I was lucky I didnt step on it... After the shower we went to a very nice place with live music.

Day five. Had to go back to Campinas. The way again very beautiful, but it felt bad to go back to (compared to Minas Gerais) boring Campinas....

Pictures will come in a bit! So long

There were these sweet, small little monkeys in the garden outside the house. They were really sweet. Tried to feed them with mandarines, but they didn't go for that..

The nice university..

The pool that I had all for myself!

..and there was a big (very tasty) cake.

On saturday we went to this party. It was a party for the church somehow.., but it felt more like some crazy streetparty..

The house

Chris family (and me..)

Ribeirão Preto

This sunday was mothers day and just like any good son in Brazil Chris went home to his parents to get together with the family, and I came along. He has one brother (Gustavo) and one sister (Alena). Both married with one kid.

The trip to Ribeirão Preto took about 3 h. The way is not very spectacular. Only sugarcane plantations mixed with eucalyptus plantations. The city has about 800 000 citisens.

The house was really nice. It was like a community with houses in a circle and a lake in the centre. There was also a pool that everyone could use for free. Very nice!!

We went there this saturday and first we had lunch and after this we went to the city to by something to his mother. Chris also showed me the university of Ribeirão Preto. A very nice university. It was a farm from the beginning so the buildings look really good and not very university-like.

On sunday I took a really lazy day. Hanging by the pool almost the whole day. I was completely alone. The Brazilians thing its to cold now. I would say 30 degrees is perfect for a day by the pool... Its autumn here now so in the night it gets a bit cold, so the water in the pool is not crazy warm and I guess that's what they are afraid of...

Sao paulo

Some parts look this good! (some dont.., also passed the ´favelas´ that´s where the pore people lives..)

The japanese courner..

The monument, and of course I had to climb it..

The nice park with Tanira, ?(sorry forgott the name..), Me and Chris..

The long line to the museum..

Sao Paulo

This saturday we (Chris, Ita, Tanira and one more..) went to Sao Paulo. It´s an about 1 1/2 - 2 hours long bus ride from Campinas. The plan was to go to this museum where there is an exhibition with real bodies. Sounds really cool I think. Unfortuanetly there were a lot of other people who thought it sounded cool: When we got there there was a 1 h long line to wait for bying the ticket and then a nother 5 h to get in to the museum. We decided not to go there...

Instead we walked around a bit in the nice park were the museum lies and saw this monument from the colonization time of Brazil. After this we went to tha japanese part of Sao paulo. Here we walked along all the market and looked on all the crazy thibgs you could by..

I now live at Chris and Ita´s plays. It´s a nice house with 3 rooms and kitchen and bath room. One living room, one work room and another one for sleeping. (Yes, we sleep all 3 in the same room). The area is maybe not as nice as where I stayed before, but much closer to the university..

One problem here is that even at the university people don´t really talk english. And I don´t talk portuguese... And it´s hard to learn, the pronounsiation is somethimes very strange for me...

Now I´m at the laboratorium. Should start with that instead of writing here..