This time I am into writing about my trip to Porto Alegre, Brasil in October. I’ve been there for almost five days and stayed at Carol’s house. Carol is a lovely young woman I met in Dublin and became friends. We were classmates for only two weeks, but we were part of the party goers group and started to go out together, travel and do quite a lot of stuff too (eg: we went to Liverpool the both of us, I did post about it a while ago).
The thing is, after we realized we had a connection and enjoyed so much our trip to Liverpool, specially for The Beatles tours and museums, we always shared stuff about music.
One day, in May I think, she writes me to tell me Paul McCartney was going to play in Porto in October and I was more than welcome to stay at her house. At first I thank her for the tempting invitation but I was completely sure I wouldn’t be able to go.
After two weeks I decided that chance would never be repeated. Paul is old, Carol is constantly moving and that was a great opportunity to travel to Brasil and visit her place too, so the next thing I did was to book the flights.
I traveled with Gol which I find a great company and nothing could have been better since I sat on my seat.
Porto Alegre is a very cozy place. The weather was great though it rained a bit, but I was freezing in Mar del Plata at that time, so I enjoyed it. The city is nice, looks like a place where thousands of people call home. I loved the fact that is not touristic, I literally went to see people in their everyday life: going to work, jogging, going home, buying...
First day was Thursday and I met Carol’s family who are absolutely adorable people who spoiled me a lot in my stay and were super cute and caring. At night, Carol and I went to a thematic bar called ‘Spoiler’ about popular Tv Shows with real spoilers all over the place. It was way cool and the drinks were amazing, as well as the food. I had so much fan talking with her, putting each other up with our lives. Again, I have to say how much I loved that the bar and the streets were full of locals having fan with friends as any other Thursday of their year.
Next day, Friday, was the big concert day. I was so fucking excited the hole day I just can’t explain in words. The Beatles is my favorite band. I seriously hear them a lot and apart from that, some of their songs have personal meaning to me, eg. my mom is a huge fan too and sang Michelle to me when I was a baby, and because my dad was dj when young, he more than once told me about how people got crazy dancing their music back in the seventies.
So watching Sir Paul live was an experience I treasure so much! Carol and I couldn’t stop singing and dancing for almost three hours. He played 38 songs, unbelievable but true and interacted with the audience speaking in Portuguese, he’s such a cutie.
Saturday was a tour around the centre day. We walked, ate local food (which I love to do), visited museums and typical main attractions of course. Carol’s father is a great artist and he was part of refurbishing the Government palace, which I found outstanding by watching such a Portuguese building with those details and colors, so original and beautiful.
At night of course, we went to party to a pub which was crowded from 7pm (that’s early in SouthAmerica) and had a Samba band playing for two hours and Goshhhh it was so good! I had the best strawberry caipirinha there and met Carol’s friend, all pretty lovely. Next, we went to a disco to move the hips.
Sunday was another great day. Carol’s family took me to Gramado, a very touristic place in the South of Brasil known for the German style of the town. It has a lot of chocolate shops (hell of good chocolate) and adorable architecture, the gothic cathedral was a huge surprise to me. We had an amazing typical lunch too and walked, it was really crowded with Brazilians, because the day was sunny bright. We also went to Canela, another town with a natural park with waterfalls. So my day was filled with nature and culture, couldn’t have been better.
Monday I decided to go to Torres, a city by the coast, because Carol had to work. Five hours by bus and not really a good idea. That place I thought would have more tourists, was empty. It was sunny and hot but very windy, so nobody went to the beach. I just walked by the shore and get to know Torres, but that’s all. I really felt a bit out of the bubble there. Anyway, at night Carol and I went to a restaurant with funny phrases on the wall which I couldn’t stop reading and laughing about the whole dinner. I love to read and speak Portuguese! The food was again fantastic.
Tuesday was my last day, I took a bus tour in the morning around the outskirts of Porto Alegre and I got to see the neighborhoods and the lagoon beach.
All in all, my trip was way better than I expected and that is everything to me. Carol’s hospitality made me feel part of the family and I adored that.
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