But wait! There aren´t any more steps!

We always knew that we´d have a week off from school during the end of/after Carnaval. A group of us thus decided to take a trip out of Salvador in order to wind down and relax after all the partying and neverending-ness that came along with the festivities. So, six of us ended up getting tickets to go to a national park six hours away, in the interior of Bahia, to a town called Lençois. Lençois was founded by diamond miners in the mid-1800s and the word itself means ´´sheets´´ -- when the pioneers came to the town, the white tents of the miners looked like sheets that were stretched out to dry. We ended up using Lençois as our base camp to explore the nearby national park, called Chapada Diamantina, which has lots of trails and waterfalls, as well as other adventures that were eagerly awaiting our visit.

Even though Carnaval went through the middle of Wednesday, we left before then, because we had soaked up enough of Carnaval´s music and whatnot (you hear the same songs all day, every day) to last us until who knows when. Three of us (Greg (USA), Jamilly (Brazil), and I) took a night bus on Monday night and arrived in Lençois around 5:30am on Tuesday morning. The other three people in our group had Carnaval plans for Tuesday, so they (Tatiana (Brazil), Sheberon (Sweden), and Sheberon´s friend, Kim (he was visiting from Denmark)) came on the night bus on Tuesday night.

Tuesday morning when we got to the place we were staying, since our room wasn´t ready (all the people there for Carnaval brought the pousada (bed and breakfast inn) to full capacity), we had to wait in the outdoor lounge area, which, fortunately, had comfy chairs. It wasn´t until people came down for breakfast that we woke up. We got to eat breakfast there, too, and it was a total feast! Lots of different kinds of breads, juice, jam, cinnamon-ey things (does it really matter what the ´´things´´ were?), and lots of things you feel no guilt about eating because you know you´ll work it off later. After breakfast, the three of us ended up walking around the town and spending a few hours out and about. Then we came back to check on the status of our room, and since it was mostly ready, we dropped our stuff in the room, got lunch in town and headed out for our first official hike. Many trails in and around Lençois require a guide, so we went on a nearby hike that we could do ourselves, which led us to Cachoeirinha, a ´´large and impressive waterfall with a wide and swimmable pool,´´ according to my guidebook. In other words, it was a pretty basic hike and the water felt great! On our way back, we stopped at this 5-star hotel for ice cream (which was, as to be expected, delicious), and then later on at night, we out for a pizza dinner in town.

By Wednesday morning, our group was complete, and after our regular feast of a breakfast, we were all ready to go. After all, we had quite the hike ahead of us. 7km (~4.35 miles) there, 7km back. Our destination was Cachoeira do Sossego (Sossego Falls), which are located on the same river as the Ribeirâo do Meio rock-slide. This hike consisted of about two hours of hikehike (through trees, ascension/descension, etc.), and then a little over an hour of climbing over and around big boulder-like rocks. You need a guide for this tour because there is no clear path and it is most certainly *not* well-trodden. We got to Sossego by about 12:30pm/1pm or so, so it was the perfect time, in the heat of the day, to jump off a cliff into the water below, and then climb on some rocks behind the waterfall before going swimming again. Then after awhile at the falls, it was time to take the same path back. Toward the end, though, was the rock-slide. What is a rock-slide, you may ask? Well, you know what rocks are. And you know what a slide is. Now, imagine going down a slide of rocks. Okay, it wasn´t exactly a slide of rocks...It was like one big rock, actually, and most of it was smooth (some parts, though, were not). It was, to say the least, an experience. Well, I´ll be honest with you. It was *two* experiences (I went down twice). By the time we made it back to the pousada, we were all worn out, but not enough to keep us from going out and having a delicious Italian dinner. (By the way, another new food I´ve tried is this yummy dessert called brigadeiro. It is a little ball of chocolate icing with a liquid chocolate center. Total decadence and totally deserved!)

It´s important on trips like these (not just the mini-trips, but all trips, all the time) to make them worthwhile and to make every moment count. You never know if you will be able to go back to a place, so if there is something you want to do when you are in a place, though the phrase is super-clichéd, the oft-heard ´´there is no time like the present´´ rings true. Thursday was another full day of touring. We piled into this big truck (not a Carnaval truck -- and don´t worry, there were seatbelts) and spent the day seeing various caves and grottos. The first stop was a place called Poço do Diabo (Devil´s Pool), a ´´deep basin at the bottom of an imposing 50m waterfall formed by the Rio Mucugezinho.´´ I didn´t know the name of this place when we got there, and maybe it´s for the better, because I partook in all of the available activities there (well, perhaps I shouldn´t say ´´all,´´ as I suppose people are always jumping off of random surfaces at high altitudes and coming up with new extreme sports). There was, for example, a zipline ride that started at an altitude of 18m (59 feet) and went straight into the water --> did that (super fun!). Then, after I got out of the water, the head of the adventure tour company (who had come along with our group and had brought his kids) told me to come rappelling with them. And, strangely enough, I said ok. The older son (who had gone before), went first. The younger one (age 11), who had never gone before, went next. Then, it was my turn. Knowing it was an altitude of 22m (72.18 feet) didn´t help matters any, and this rappel wasn´t climbing down rocks; rather, it was more like being suspended in mid-air and just lowering yourself using a rope..still being alongside a rock, but not running the risk of bumping into it. After a five-minute-or-so lesson of how rappelling works, it was go-time (or not-go time). So, the guy in charge told me to turn around (you have to go down backwards) and to put my foot on this little step below the top. I did that, and then he told me to put my other foot there, so I did that. Harnessed in, with my helmet and gloves and no other questions to ask the guy (I had already asked, for example, ´´Is the rope going to break?´´ and of course felt a little bit better when he said no), I then said, ´´But wait! There aren´t any more steps!´´ And he agreed and said, ´´Right! There are no more steps.´´ And the only things left for me to do, as per his instructions, were to lean back, take my feet off the ledge, and start lowering myself down. I did just that, and after about 15 seconds of thinking, ´´What the hell am I doing suspended in a cavey place hanging on by just a rope?´´ it all of a sudden snapped into a, ´´Holy **** -- this is *so* cool....I´m suspended in a cavey place, hanging on by just a rope!´´ And the rope spun a little bit (slowly), so I wasn´t facing the wall anymore, but was facing the whole rest of the basin and seeing all the people down below, who had been waiting for me to take those final steps to go off the edge (and go off the edge I did!). 22 meters later, I stepped out of the harness and jumped into the water, feeling as refreshed as ever.

Thursday´s tour then continued to the Gruta da Pratinha, where a bunch of us went snorkeling. This was pretty cool because it was so dark in there that we needed flashlights, but I think I shined my flashlight in the wrong places, because I saw the most fish when we came toward the light at the end of our swim. That water also connected to this huge lake where the water was bright blue. There was a zipline there, too, that I had originally decided I wasn´t going to do since I had already done the other one, but once I saw the water, I quickly reconsidered. (It just looked too good to pass up.) This one was at an altitude of 12m (39.4 feet), and, okay, okay, I ended up going twice. Afterwards, our tour group had lunch and continued to our next destination: Gruta Lapa Doce, which has a lot of stalactites and stalagmites. I also learned the difference between a gruta and a caverna. Apparently, a gruta (grotto) has an entrance and an exit, whereas a caverna (cave) only has an entrance (which, I suppose, would also be the exit). Once we left Lapa Doce, there was one more place left on the agenda: Morro do Pai Inâcio. We were headed to this plateau-type place to see sunset, but we got there 20 minutes too late for the cut-off time (but still before sunset). The guards wouldn´t let us go by to do the 15-minute hike up the mountain, so we piled back into the car and headed back to Lençois proper. A frustrating end to the tour, but when you put it in perspective, it´s not the end of the world. The six of us ended up going out for dinner in town with the other two people on our tour (from São Paulo), and now I have two new people to hang out with when I head to São Paulo next week!

Friday morning, Sheberon (Sweden) and Kim (Denmark) left on an early bus back to Salvador because they were going to take a weekend trip, so that brought our group down to four. Jamilly (Brazil) and Tatiana (Brazil) decided to have a low-key day, so they stayed in Lençois during the day. Greg (USA) and I decided to go on another hike and we ended up going to Cachoeira da Fumaça. It is possible to do a three-day hike to get to the bottom of this 340m (~1,115.5 ft) waterfall, but our group drove a good ways away and then we did a 6km (~3.73 mi.) hike to get to the top of the falls (and then, of course, we hiked back). From our vantage point, though, once we got to the top of the falls, it was so much higher than the falls that the falls looked like a mere trickle of water that it was hard to believe that there was actually a huge waterfall down there. To get to the edge of this cliff to look down, I decided to lie down on the ground and crawl to the edge (more like shimmy, really) because there weren´t any railings and one slip of the foot, well,...let´s just say that since I didn´t have my harness, it felt safer to stop, drop, and *not* roll. After we left Fumaça, Junior (our tourguide, who had also been our tourguide the day before) said that if the group picked up the pace, we might be able to get to Pai Inâcio to catch sunset, so everyone hustled down the mountain and the climb that had taken us about 2 hours in ascension took about 1 hour and 25 minutes to descend. By the time we got down, however, he was skeptical that we would make it in time, and ultimately, Junior ended up deciding that we wouldn´t make it in time. So, we ended up going to Rio Mucugezinho (the same river I rappelled/ziplined into, but a different part of the river) and going for an evening swim there before heading back to town. When we got back to town, we met up with Tatiana and Jamilly again and headed out for dinner at that five-star hotel (at the restaurant) to celebrate Greg´s birthday, replete with chocolate cake and all. The version of ´´Happy Birthday´´ that Brazilians sing has several verses, it´s really incredible! I didn´t know the words, though, so I made up syllables on the spot. Sure beats memorization. After dinner, there wasn´t too much time to spend in Lençois because Jamilly and I caught the midnight bus back to Salvador.

We got back into Salvador on Saturday morning at about 6am or so and this weekend has been all about the relaxation that last week was supposed to be. It´s all good, though, because that trip was well worth it. Last night, I went out with Sheberon (Sweden), Kim (Denmark), Sheberon´s host sister, Paloma (Brazil), Sheberon´s Brazilian friend, Jaime (Spain), and Salvador (USA). It was a low-key ´´out´´ night and sometimes I played translator (Portuguese-English) for Kim and Paloma, which was fun.

That´s basically been my life for the last week or so, but before I go, there´s one topic of conversation that really piqued my interest on Friday´s Fumaça tour, so I thought I´d share. Two Canadians on our tour, who were also staying at our pousada, are traveling for the next seven months. Mike and Gina have been planning this trip for a fair bit of time and when I was talking to Gina about it, she was explaining the trip as her ´´first retirement.´´ I asked her where she got that idea and she told me that she learned about it from a book she read. Now, since I haven´t read the book, I´m not going to insert a shameless plug here for said book (besides, if you were really so curious, I´m sure y´all could figure it out on your own), but the idea is one that I would like to subscribe to -- or rather, continue to subscribe to. The idea is that, instead of waiting until hitting 65 to retire and travel and do all the things you wish you could have done when you were younger and had time, money, etc., that you have little retirements along the way. For example, you work for x-amount of time (say, 2 years) and then you take a few months off and travel or volunteer or do whatever you would want to do during your ´´retirement.´´ This, to me, sounds like a good idea. Of course, it isn´t for everybody, but from the sound of it, it *is* for me.

So, I leave you with that. Discuss amongst yourselves.
Happy retiring, whether you are 25 or 105.

missy :)
http://andsmilestogobeforeisleep.blogspot.com