8/14/14

Today we took a city tour of Florianopolis, which started out with a walk through the downtown area. We walked past shops, street vendors selling handmade goods and local produce, and tried some caldo do cana (fresh-squeezed sugarcane juice with lime), It was too sweet for me to finish. We walked to the historic fig tree in the center of downtown, which is so big it literally has steel columns all around supporting its branches. Next, we got on a bus that took us up to a mountain where you could look out over the entire city, and get a sense of how big and densely developed it is. It was one of the most surreal views of the entire trip, and was worthy of becoming the new background phone. There were also some really nice houses on the way up the mountain overlooking the city, which reminded me of something you would see along the PCH in California. After the mountain, we did a loop to the southern part of the island and back up, where we stopped at several beaches. The best part was when we went to Lagoa, a lake that runs into the ocean via a manmade canal. We walked up to these dunes where people were sand boarding, and raced down on foot. We also ate lunch at a beachfront restaurant right next to the mouth of the canal, where we had some delicious fresh seafood that I couldn’t finish (I think they gave me a whole fish). After lunch, the less intelligent guys in the group, myself included, decided to go for an icy cold dip in the ocean that had to be in the 50’s since it was only 65 outside. It was painful to say the least, but I couldn’t let myself be on the beach in Brazil without going in the ocean. Worth it? Absolutely.