Day 20 - Bem venido a Sao Paulo.

13:55
Some good sleeps all around, and we’re bundled into our car to head back to Floripa for our flight up to Sao Paulo. Vicks has kindly offered to sit in the front seat for the 2 hour journey, as I’ve borne the brunt of trying to communicate with our various drivers over the past couple of weeks. This is a bonus, as it means I have less of a constant view of our driver’s driving style. It is, at best, erratic. At worst, it’s pretty fucking dangerous. His favourite trick is cruising up behind the bumper of another car on the highway, then sitting a couple of feet from their bumper until they move out of the way. Thankfully, no one brake-tests him. The traffic is pretty heavy in places, but it’s a pleasant enough journey.

I think I mentioned in a previous post that Florianopolis Airport is v cool, and spending more time here only confirms that. It’s both literally and figuratively cool, and highly efficient. We’re pretty much the only people as we head through security. The departure lounge is spacious, and has lots of seating/eating options. This is just as well, as our flight is delayed - initially by 25 minutes, then 40 minutes, and currently 55 minutes. Fingers crossed it stays where it is…

We’re collectively not quite sure how to prepare ourselves for Sao Paulo. It comes with many of the same health and safety warnings as Rio, so we’ll need to remind ourselves to be extra cautious. It’s also massive. Like, properly huge. The central city’s population is around 11.5 million, but the greater Sao Paulo area (think Greater London) has a population of very nearly 23 million. That’s 3 times the size of London. By any metric, it’s one of the biggest cities on the planet, and we have but 36 hours to get to know it. It’s also (and I hope not to offend any Paulistans here…) less charismatic than Rio. Sao Paulo is known as a financial and political powerhouse, and has less of a reputation for fun times than Rio. I’m sure there’s more than enough to fill a few days of exploring, but due to the intentional brevity of our stay, we’ll need to be a little more selective…

19:30
Things did not progress brilliantly. I get a message from the car service meeting us in Sao Paulo to let me know they can’t wait to meet our delayed flight, as booking.com did not record the booking as an airport pick-up. I query this, as the pick-up point is AT the airport. There’s nothing the can do though. I briefly try booking.com's customer services chat feature, but grow to want to punch the screen. Our flight’s about to board, so we’ll just have to figure out a transport option when we get Congonhas airport.

I actually manage to sleep most of the flight. Certainly helps pass the time effectively. We land around an hour late. Deplaned, we make our way to baggage reclaim, and - nothing. Our flight is shown on one of the luggage carousels. We wait (im)patiently. 20 minutes pass. Our flight disappears from the screen. There’s a murmuring among the crowd. It doesn’t look like any baggage is being delivered to any of the carousels. I ask a member of GOL staff where the bags are. I’m met with a dismissive shrug. Apparently it’s not their fault, and that’s all that matters. It’s hot in the airport, and it’s getting increasingly crowded as more flights arrive, and their passengers await their bags. Around 70 minutes after landing, our bags finally emerge, and we make our way to the Uber pick-up point. A couple of drivers accept our trip, then cancel after we’ve been waiting for 5 minutes. My blood is slowly beginning to boil. A driver finally picks us up, and we proceed to take 45 minutes to drive 6 miles. I suspect Sao Paulo traffic is bad at all times of day. but we’re bang in the middle of rush hour. There’s some artistic driving on display, and i’m stunned not to see more motorcyclists knocked to the ground, so aggressively do they weave in and out of traffic.

We arrive to our hotel a little after 19:00, check-in and make our way to our room. The window is broken, and won’t close. FFS. The helpful hotel staff move us to another room which is fine. None of these things in isolation are a particularly big deal, but the litany of speed-bumps across the day has added up. We head out in search of Caipis and food.

21:45
There’s a beautiful little street opposite our hotel lined with bars and restaurants, and we park ourselves on the terrace of one of them. Tamsin and I each have a massively deserved and needed Caipirinha, before sharing a decent bottle of white. The food is really good. Vicki and Tam both have fish, and I have a veal dish, cooked in a Madeira sauce. The temperature’s pleasant, but cool. I’d not realised Sao Paulo is almost 1,000m above sea level, and so it’ll feel a good few degrees cooler than Rio does by the coast. We’re all knackered after what’s felt like a loooooong day’s travel. Bed time for us. Czytaj więcej