Brazil is the land of sun, sea, beaches, blue skies and of course the rainforest… Of course we realize that this is not true and of course we know that sooner or later we will experience autumnal conditions on our journey south. In Florianopolis, we slowly started to experience this, but on our penultimate stop, we headed further south and a little inland. And suddenly we are in Praia Grande, standing with our rental car in front of 750m high cliffs on a plateau into which 14 different rivers have carved several canyons. And it can get cold here too, we prepare ourselves for nights with 10°C, but it doesn’t get that bad!

But it’s all a bit absurd, up to now we’ve known canyons more as deep gorges. Of course there are canyons here too, but you can see both the beginning and the end of the canyon – and in good weather even the sea in the background…

We spend the first night in Praia Grande at the foot of the plateau and as we arrive relatively late, we just get a few – useless – tips from the tourist center, visit a hidden and surprisingly impressive waterfall and chat a bit with a dance teacher who shares the hostel with us. In general, we have really entered the low season, there is almost nothing going on!

We set off early the next morning to drive to the top of the plateau. It takes around 1.5 hours, initially on winding, more or less paved roads, later it becomes a gravel road. First we visit the canyon “Itaimbezinho” and walk along the edge and see two more huge waterfalls and are even so lucky with the weather that we can at least get a good view of the plain in front of the canyon – the coast remains hidden from us 🙂

We visit the second canyon, “Fortaleza”, in the afternoon and hike along the edge for another 4 hours. And then we see how the canyon becomes flatter and flatter and walk through a few bushes and over a small trickle of a stream, the beginning of the canyon. Always in the knowledge that 500m further on, there are already hundreds of meters of steep drop.

Then the weather suddenly changes and we are surrounded by fog and decide to try the two shorter hikes to a viewpoint and a “floating stone” again the next morning. We walk the 3 km back along the road to the car, hoping perhaps to be able to hitch a ride. But at some point Tobi doesn’t feel like it anymore, leaves the rucksacks with Kerstin and jogs off to the car, only to be caught up 5 minutes later by a park ranger’s jeep, with a grinning Kerstin in the passenger seat…

We drive to our next hostel in Cambara do Sul, only about 30 minutes away. The next morning we don’t have much luck with the fog for the viewpoints, but the weather is ok at the “floating stone” and we can go for a short hike. The stone is not worth mentioning, but the path leads us barefoot through the water over the largest waterfall in the park and we wade through the river about 5-10 meters from the abyss (about 500m deep). A very fun experience! After Kerstin almost steps on a snake at the end of the path, the air is a little out and we walk back to the car in the rain, which has now caught up with us, and drive to our last stop and return destination, Porto Alegre…

PS: We search for the snake on the internet later, but don’t really find out whether it was one of the most poisonous snakes in South America or a completely harmless viper. They just look too similar….^^