seekingmygreaterperhaps

Part 2 of the October break trip.

After escaping the jungle and the mosquitos, we found ourselves in beautiful Bonito. This small city in Matta Grosso is known for it’s freshwater activities, most notably, it’s snorkeling. I was amazed at the beautiful nature and our activities. The tour company really did a nice job putting together our itinerary. Rather than listing off day by day, I’m just going to give you all of them. It also rained a lot while we were there… like every day, but this happens when traveling. I am not going to abandon ship just because of the rain. Things get altered of course, but I will make the most of it!

Our first activity was the gorgeous (and bumpy) Estancia Mimosa. We started with a farm-to-table lunch that was deliciousssss. Then we went on a hike to see some incredible waterfalls!.

If you look to the left of the waterfall, we had one brave Brazilian elect to swim. It was too cold for me, and bit of hiking remained, so I passed.

This reminds me of something out of Lord of the Rings, or from another planet even. It was so green!

My travel companions (me, Mali, and Sofia).

Another amazing perk of visiting Bonito is the food. Freshwater fish are the specialty, and this might be the best fish I’ve tasted, prepared in a variety of ways.

Here you can see fish “parmigiana” as well as moqueca. Plus all the sides that come with it. This was at Casa de Joao, and I highly recommend going there if you want delicious food. It’s huge and also vastly popular, so prepare to wait a little bit.

I hope I never quite get used to seeing majestic birds in the wild. We saw macaws and toucans on this trip, and it really reminds me to slow down and be grateful that this is my actual life.

We went snorkeling 2 times. Above is in Rio Sucuri, and this one was my favorite. Notice the wetsuit. It was a bit nippy, and with it being cloudy, not too warm in the water. I was thankful for the wetsuit. You can see how clear the water is behind me, because you are looking straight to the bottom.

Mali brought her underwater camera! I think we ate these guys cousins later that night… oops. But also yum.

Above is Gruta do Lago Azul. The picture does not do it justice, it was quite a cool sight to behold. It was not the spelunking experience I have had at Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. This was a lot of steps down to the gigantic opening of the cave, more steps down to see the blue lake, and then turn around and come back up. The blue is azure and so unique! It reminds me of the Adriatic Sea.

Our last day we did tubing down a river and a few “cascades.” I won’t say waterfalls, because I am alive here typing this post, but water was falling down them. I had a lot of laughter on this short tubing experience because Sofia was on the struggle tube and our guides were helping her out a bunch. The weather had cleared up a little bit and our guides were funny!

I don’t have any pictures of it, but also on this trip Mali and I did a rafting experience! I love white water rafting, even if this was a bit tamer than that. We also were troopers and did it in the rain. On the rafting trip we saw a lot of toucans flying above us!

At the Natural Aquarium, we did another freshwater snorkeling trip. It blows my mind how clear the water is! My personal highlight was not in the water… I had turned over (probably God telling me to look up) to see two troops of monkeys playing in the trees. They might have been squabbling, I’m not sure, I don’t speak monkey. We were floating in a thin river, and the monkeys were jumping from branch to branch, over the river! This was my first time seeing monkeys in the wild. They are so cute!

It took me too long after the fact to write this post- which is why it is mostly me describing the pictures… Oops! Thanks for hanging in there, just like the monkeys.

Tchau!