3rd day Serra do Corvo Branco - São Joaquim (Dec 18, 2007)

Foggy morning, heading to the mountain town of Urubici, nice scenario, landscape resembles Europe, very green. After a cup of coffee and some conversation with the staff of the local tourist bureau (with big pictures of snow-covered mountain tops on the wall - this is the only region in Brazil with regular snowfalls im Winter) I hit the road towards São Joaquim: Asphalt very little traffic, great panoramas. Meadows with cows, rests of native forests, an archeological site with wall paintings, a big waterfall looming in a distance of about 5 km. At Vacas Gordas ("Fat cows") light rain. Passing through a village with utterly shabby huts, drunken men on the street. An impressive thunderstorm on the road, I ask for shelter in an old man's hut. After that bad whether until São Joaquim, a fruit-growing center, known as Brazil's coldest city, but not very interesting. I stay in a pousada. The next morning I take a bus to Curitiba via Lages since I have to attend a student's presentation in Curitiba the next day.