ISABM Lencois Brasilia

Our Journal

Lencois to Brasilia

“…which is greater, the road or the pothole? Sometimes there is more road than pothole and sometimes there is more pothole than road. The pothole, having nothing to do with the pothead, but can give you a bad case of potty-mouth as you personify it as an a-hole – or was it the a-hole pothead who didn’t pave the road correctly because he was so stoned?. Rumor has it that further in toward the Amazon they have mutated and grown teeth and try to bite your tire. They have developed intelligence and hunt in packs, hiding over humps and behind curbs…”

The mind rambles and bumps along in strange ways. An hour out of Lencois we hit some horrid road. At a gas station a talkative trucker walked over and told us what to expect further down the road, more dirt and broken road. I asked if it was any better than what we had just passed. He answered, “Saying ‘better’ or ‘worse’ in Bahia doesn’t make any sense, it’s all bad.” We left early morning and drove all day. The road was mostly cut straight into bushes that walled in both sides. Trucks swerve all over the road to avoid potholes. Traffic follows no rules, sometimes exchanging lanes with us, sometimes forcing us out of the way. We passed through Bom Jesus do Lapa where a church was build right into the sides of a giant rock structure. The landscape turned into fertile farm and cattle country. At a gas stop we were thinking about stopping for the day but the attendant told us that the next town, Correntina, was small and nice. We drove on.

At Correntina we pulled into a hotel. After hearing we had never been to Correntina the owner pulled a framed collage off the wall and pointed out everything we should visit. We walked down to a small town river walk where kids played in the rapids. Everyone seemed to be busy with something and we didn’t see any of the sitting that took place in northeast towns. We followed another sign to the “seven islands” a couple of miles out of town. The road turned to smooth pavement from cobblestones and joggers spandexed all about. We had never seen this in Brazil. We walked the road down to the river where it ended at a bridge that led to little islands in the middle of the river all with little bridges connected them. Walking back to town, we praised the city planners who organized a little pueblo on the river a nice place to stop and visit. We ate plates of food paid by the kilo that were delicious, or does riding all day make everything taste like that?

The next morning we road out through more bad road and then hit some great abandoned pavement, all smooth that cut straight through… nothing, two walls of vegetation on both sides. Later we hit main highway and with lot of trucks. Rain slowed us down a couple of times but we were making great time. All day we passed mammoth farms separated by neat lines of trees. Then 140 km outside of Brasilia the rain really started. My jacked ripped from the wind and I was freezing trying to remember not to let my body tense up from the cold.

The mind gets strained after hours on the bike, the rain, and the monotony of riding through nothing, at least that is how I would explain the other worldly feeling of driving into Brasilia. The road passed straight into the city with neat, equidistant curved exits on both sides. Traffic is multiple laned but flows nicely. I was so disoriented I was afraid to change lanes or exit. We eventually exited and doubled back and luckily at the gas stop, a guy was heading our way and led us over to the Hotel Sector South, not to be confused with Hotel Sector North. There is a sector for everything in this town. Embassy sector, restaurant sector, government sector, park sector. Everything organized, neat, nothing to pedestrian scale… not human. The city was built in less than four years during Kubitschek’s “50 years in 5” plan. It reminded me starkly of architecture in Central/Eastern Europe.

The next day we walked the city. We stepped onto a crosswalk and traffic automatically stopped. This was no Latin America we had ever seen before. It takes a long time to get anywhere and crossing six lanes of traffic in the center of the city is hazardous. It didn’t feel like anything in Brasil we had experienced. No congregations of people, no walking, no corner stores. We paid a visit to the Paraguayan embassy since they require U.S. citizens to get a passport, $50 for a one-entry visa that only lasts 60 days. I forget, what did we do to offend them? We decided to see what would happen if we entered the Ministry of Tourism to ask if we could stay in Brazil a little bit longer. The Ministries are all lined up (equidistant, identical buildings) in a kind of Ministry Mall. We explained to the receptionist that we wanted to stay in Brazil, she got on the phone in a hushed voice. Someone came out and sent us over to the Ministry of Exterior Relations, on the other side of Ministry Mall. We crossed six lanes of traffic, another six lanes and made it to the other ministry. We accidentally walked into the Ministry of Health and were sent toward the right ministry. A woman outside listened to our story and sent us over to the Consular, who we assumed would let us stay in Brazil. But, the Consular had left 47 minutes before and wouldn’t be back for six days. Unfortunately, our visas only have four days left so we’ll have to make a mad dash for the border. Back at the hotel we found on the internet a great site where you can check the road conditions of every road in Brazil. The best and fastest roads will take us to Iguazu Falls. We’re having a hard time talking or writing about leaving Brazil so I’ll have to stop here. We know nothing about Paraguay except they have the most expensive visa in South America and after Brazil, are the only country requiring Americans to have a visa. More from there.

abrazos, Chris