The first country I visited in South America was Brazil in October 2013. Although my memory of the holiday is a bit hazy, it is still one of my all-time favourite holidays and I can't wait to revisit the country.
We only had time to visit three main places in Brazil: Manaus, Iguaçu (aka Iguazú) Falls, and, of course, Rio. Manaus is very close to the Amazon rainforest, and here we learnt a lot about how the indigenous tribes live and saw a lot of wildlife. This part of the trip was very wholesome, consisting of visits to monkey sanctuaries and fishing (for the first time) for piranhas. My favourite part about Manaus was probably the 'meeting of the waters': this is the point at which two rivers (Rio Negro and Amazon River) meet, however they don't mix (apparently due to the different speeds, temperatures, and densities of the waters), leading to a very visual phenomena.
Having since seen Niagara Falls and Victoria Falls, Iguaçu still remains the most impressive waterfall in my memory; the sheer volume of water was astounding. We managed to see the falls from both the Brazilian and Argentine sides (I found Brazil's side more impressive), and we took a boat ride to some of the smaller falls, which was very entertaining (despite getting drenched).
In true city-girl fashion, I was most excited about Rio de Janeiro, and Rio certainly didn't disappoint. I love cities that are near the sea (including Barcelona, Hong Kong, and Funchal) and between Rio's mountains, beaches, and landmarks, we were never bored. Our first full day in Rio was supposed to consist of visiting Sugarloaf Mountain and seeing some favelas amongst other things (both of which I was interested in seeing), and whilst my family did manage to explore the city, I was suffering from food poisoning in the hotel, and so forwent the experience. (This trip was also the only time I threw up on a plane, again due to food poisoning). Nonetheless, I made a speedy recovery and managed to see the Selarón steps, Christ the Redeemer, and Copacobana beach (all of which I'd strongly recommend).
Although Brazil gets a bad rap for its high crime level, I never felt unsafe and the locals were all very welcoming towards us. Granted, we are Portuguese so perhaps the reason we felt safer than the average tourist was because we could understand everything. The way Brazilians speak Portuguese is so different from how the Portuguese speak it, with the Brazilians having a more 'sing-songy' rhythm (similar to Italian) and the Portuguese having a much more 'serious' tone (similar to Russian) - in fact, many of my friends say that my mum's accent sounds Russian! They also have a lot of idioms that aren't used in Portugal (or worse, are rude in Portugal). The lifestyle in Brazil is much slower than I'm used to and people were very relaxed, which was a welcomed change from London's busy pace. I'm a big fan of Brazilian food, with picanha, black beans, feijoada, and pineapple with cinnamon being the most memorable.
I've been eager to return to this beautiful country and will hopefully be blogging about Porto Alegre and São Paulo soon!
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