How I Love Thee, Itacare

Today is a holiday in Brazil, similar to Valentines Day, hence my appreciation for my love of Itacare. Yesterday we had our last day of surf lessons. I was a bit rocky at first, but then i conquered. J really got the hang of surfiny yesterday. Last night we ate dinner and took a nap. We picked up our certificates from the surf shop, saying we are officially AWESOME beginner surfers. Then we went to go see a friend Rut (like root) performing his reggae show at a local bar. He was great, and reggae in Portuguese is awesome. Today we woke up a little bit late because we didnt have a surf lesson. We walked all the way to the beach called Prainha. It is supposed to be a 45 minute walk, but we accidentally took the long way because someone gave us the wrong directions and we hiked for two hours! The hike was gorgeous though. We walked through and over waterfalls. We saw all kinds of animals, including the bluest butterfly i have ever seen. Finally we got to the beach...drop dead gorgeous. On our way back as we were finally leaving the jungle (we took the 45 minute short way back) these boys pointed and said the portuguese word for spider, and to our surprise there was an enormous tarantula! And i thought the massive snails at the hostel were crazy! We made french toast for dinner and now my tummy is happy. Rut invited us to see his show at Jungle Bar tonight, and I believe we will. But who knows!

Surf Day 2

So today was day two of surf lessons. We carried our boards all the way to the fourth beach (ribera or something). We first practiced how to stand on the board in the sand, and then we took a stab at it in the water. I stood up on my first try and rocked it! Surfing was not as hard as i expected, but just as fun. It is so exhilirating to work so hard at something yet feel so free. By the end of the day I was starting to turn a little and actually control my board. Maybe tomorrow they will upgrade me to a smaller board! I wish :-) After the boarding (and a lot of tough falls) we went to see a little water fall with our instructors. What fun! We then went home and showered really quick, and headed out to get a baguette at this place that had hebrew written on it in the window. I have been speaking to Adi in hebrew since I met her and she said I am really not that bad....though I often have to ask her what certain words mean and then I forget them a minute later. But, when we got to dinner the place was packed with screaming israelis and i really felt kind of awkward. It would have been nice and felt comfortable like home, but instead I was kind of embarassed that my people were acting like such animals. But, Adi was also embarassed and we carried on speaking in hebrew, which gave me that homey feelin i was looking for. Our surf instructors invited us out to a party tonight at a place called Favela so we will go to that pretty soon. We cant stay out too late though because we planned a trip for tomorrow and we have to have strength for our final surf lesson!

thinking of you all....and buying you gifts! haha

At the Hostel

There are a bunch of monkeys in the trees because we are in the tropical rain forest. SO beautiful and SO cool!

Local Surf Shop

Today we had our first surf lesson with the hottie Filipe from the Local Surf Shop. For 150 reais he will give us three days of two hour private lessons. On our first day we learned to mount the board, to sit up, several ways to turn around, and how to catch waves. Tomorrow we will stand up haha. As we were drying off from our surf lesson the guys from the Jamaican Hut invited us in for some delicious juice. They told us about a concert later in the week. I will let ya know!

salvador, ilheus and itacare

WAHOOO!! We are finally here! We landed in Salvador, Brazil and grabbed a bite to eat, then headed straight to our hostel named Alpha in Barra (pronounced ba-ha). The hostel was gross and smelled like piss so I was pretty glad to get out of there early the next morning. We chilled on the beach for a bit, then J got a Subway (they have them in Salvador!). We then hitched a bus for about 40 minutes to the bus station. On the bus we got to see pretty much all of Salvador. They have this really cool lake with statues of women dancing on it. Also, their port is absolutely gorgeous. They have a market that goes on next to the port that is just so cool. We caught a bus to Ilheus and got there just in time to catch the bus to Itacare that came six minutes later. Itacare is SO cool! It is this tiny little beach town surrounded by chill beaches. The hostels all have hammocks hanging, and you can see little monkeys from out of your window because we are in the caribbean-like rain forest. The town is filled with people traveling (many israelis!) and surfers. Unfortunately we are here for the rainy season, but we will still get up every day to learn how to surf! Tonight J and I made dinner with an Israeli girl named Adi and a German girl named Anika that are both staying at our hostel. We heard from Adi that we should try to get out of Brazil earlier than planned so we can spend more time in Peru because supposedly Peru is just absolutely awesome. The saddest news of all is that I scratched my cornea at some point in my travels, and now I cant really open my eye in direct sunlight. Hopefully that will go away soon though, because the woman of our hostel brought me to a pharmacy and helped me get drops. Here is hopin!

I am having a GREAT time!!
I hope you all are too!

And sev, I called on your birthday but nobody picked up. I hope it was a great one!!

I LOVE YOU!!

Fidel With Abbey!

Tonight we went to go see Fidel Nadal at the Niceto club with Abbey, and I took notes for a paper I have to write about Fidel Nadal. 

We're hanging out in our tiny room now listening to some songs you often hear at boliches :-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBi3H70aLzo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fGk6fYcL5A

Finally!

Last night we had this horrible school party that was a mix of summer camp and a bar mitzvah...with booze. So J and I immediately aced out of there in search of something else to do. We picked up J's brother from his hotel, went to Milion for a drink or two, and then went to Zizek. Zizek is this group of DJ's that travels the world and are now at the VooDoo bar for a couple of weeks. I was SO excited to finally see them. They were fantastic! I could've stayed and danced there forever!