Brazil – ConoSur con EmmaZwo

Traveled into the South by driving through Chuy. I again met super nice boarder control officers. I think that Austrian boarder control officers should come here and have a ‘Friendliness course’ Crossing the boarder is always quite a job for me because I have to sign a few documents regarding the car, and these employees just make the process easier and enjoyable!

Since the high season has not hit Brazil yet, I decided to drive straight through to Florianopolis. Floarianopolis has the potential to be a city, but also has an offshore, easy to reach island, making it a nice stop.

I had to change some of my car electrics so that I can use the solar power to now cool the car. The TomTom cannot stand the heat and I had to attach it to the side window so that it is not in direct sunlight (now it is just a mission getting in the car with the cable in the way)

The island Ilha da Santa Catarina has everything. A French couple and myself camped by a camp site in the Centre of Barra da Lagoa but the locals were so loud on the weekends, running through the streets high and drunk. Now we have a more chilled place close to a turtle centre that is much quieter.

The rain completely ruined the electrics from the car of the French so I used my www tools (World Wide Werkzeug) to fix it. It was a car from Chile, in Brazil that was fixed with German tools, by an Austrian. Very international!

Sometimes I feel I come across as very ‘overdressed’ with my luxury Camper. My fellow French and Chilean campers can’t refill their Chilean gas bottles and don’t want to buy any from Brazil in the next 6 weeks. So when it’s raining they can’t grill and stick to salad, this type of eating wouldn’t hurt me…

When the weathers good, I usually unpack my unicycle, slackline and kite and they’re all amazed as to how much stuff I can put in my van, and how much recreational/fun stuff I brought with me. I taught my camping neighbours how to fly my kite, the wind was quite strong so The result: Hurt myself on my left side, and messed up my knee. Foruntately the recent rain forced me to take a sporting break.

Thank god I learnt this from kiting and golf. You think you’re getting the hang of things and that you’re getting good, and then it goes downhill again.

I am now the king of the camping site since I got a “shower” It’s basically a bag of water with a hand pump that builds up pressure so that it forms a 10 litre bag. Set it up in the sun and you’re done! This kind of thing costs 55€ in Germany and 100€ here, everything thats imported is logically pricey (I was also quite shocked at the price of spare car parts)

After a series of tests, I came to realise that the battery is flat and defective after 3 days of use, plus minus. There won’t be good, functional operation without a voltage monitor. Frederike alongside Jose have sent out word to a friend in Asuncion, now the relay will be on its way there.

On the weekends on the island of Santa Catarina, everybody is around and theres a type of guiding mafia that ‘sell’ the parking spaces. We had to clear out and decided to move more into the countryside. We made ourselves a nice cluster of vans, and then the police arrived. We also had to clear out of this area. I was out cycling and apparently two fo the vans were comletely searched, whilst their guns were drawn. By the time I arrived, the situation had dissolved a bit.

During the day, I charged the laptops of the others with mt MT4000 IQ battery, whilst keeping a good look that I had enough to use for myself. When we had to leave, my car would’nt start, Pierre also needed help starting and Chico ran out of gas. The police jumped my car, but it still would not start, Pierre managed to start and got gas for Chico whilst towing me. Sadly this broke our van cluster.

I going to have to build a new battery outlet to the boardbattery, a better contact to the starting battery and ask myself why I cannot start with a board battery of 13,5 Volt und 65Ah. At the camping place ,Caminho do Rei, I fashioned a Network cable for Camilia’s computer. The people were all so amazed by my pliers, I am not sure what they were thinking…

I left my new friends to drive on, heading to Iguazu. Chico is also driving up North but his car only drives 80kmh and his charging regulator does not work so the ignition coil needs to be changed every 30 km becuase of overheating. It only takes about 2 minutes but every 30 km is a bit excessive, I am not that relaxed! I have to start chomping some kilometers.

My first stop was planned to be Curitiba, but since the camping site was closed, I drove to the next stop, following the app iOverlander. My two neighbours, Mauricio and Iguazo, the one builds four wheel drive cars and the other organisers travels of every kind and difficulty levels throughout South America.

We talked, laughed and exchanged experiences, very cool. I’m going to visit a place in Paraguay by the name of Hohenau, a friend of Mauricio lives there. Then I’ll be off to Asuncion. I’ve planned to help Mauricio with a four wheel drive project in Germany as well, I’ll definitely see these two again. They were very nice guys, both also around my age group.

The idea of leaving my car in Uruguay is becoming more and more realistic to me. Uruguay is the only country in South America where a foreign car can stay for 12 months. This way, I can leave Emmazwo there and come back next year for another travelling holiday.

Iguaza showed me pictures of Pantanal, I think my time in South America will never come to an end. There are just so many things that I still want to see/experience.

Curitiba is a huge city with about 1,8 Million residents, a ‘Car City’ with Audi, Renault, Volvo etc factories. The climate is comfortable and because it’s at about 900 meters above sea level, there are no mosquitos. Thank the mosquito nets on Emmazwo,this whole journey I’ve had insect free nights whilst the others had to ward them off with scents etc, but were still always completely full of bites. Happy to say that I did all the right things with the car!

To conclude Brazil, I visited the Waterfalls of Igauza on the Brazilian side. I was amazed as to what nature had built here; I even spoiled myself with a boat tour. Therefore, I won’t take boats on the Argentinian side of the waterfalls. One day of crossing boarders is too stressful, I’m already too stressed (I’m in a latino mode already)