Greens in Brazil - Day 1 Continued

Arriving late afternoon, after a hair raising ride through the amazon forest, (our hosts drive like they are Formula drivers on hairpin roads, that are more like gravel, in a volvo...frightening) we settled into our palace. When i say palace, it is really closer to a malibu crib meets the jungle. We have two coconut trees in our backyard, a deep blue swimming pool, and wild orchids growing all around....oh and did I mention the monkeys? The weird thing about this place, in addition to it being set in the middle of a rainforest, is the town is very unassuming - all the houses look very simple from the outside (see first picture) but then you walk into these courtyards that are unbeleivable. The other slightly bizarre thing, but I guess is normal down in developing countries, is the abundance of staff around the house. There are 4 staff people for 6 of us, and when you want a drink of water or a snack, you have to ask them...if you want cigarettes you don't go to the store but give them cash and they fetch it for you....I guess that is what its like to be a king...I don't dig so much....I just am glad to put my pants on one leg at a time like everyone else....surprisingly the house everyone else is staying at belongs to the king of brazil, that is the current heir to the throne which was abolished in the 1880s. Needless to say it is quite euro gentry...not my style but nonetheless posh.

After meeting the crew Danielle and I were immediately wisked away in a tiny vw and hiked the amazon rainforest right into these beautiful waterfalls. The water is cold, crystal clear, (think Ithaca gorges meets amazon rainforest). The thing to do here is sit on the dry rock and slide down the wet rock into the pools below...but as it is a natural formation there are some slight problems, namely speed, direction, and large rock bumps (not so good for the future children if you have problems managing speed and direction)...nonetheless invigorating and a good wakeup from the plane ride.

After a nice swim and an almost near death experience being swept away down the wrong fall (thanks buddy for lending me a hand) we went back to the place for dinner. No one wanted to cook and we were drinking like fish (these guys drink down here a lot....imagine a DB team outing 24/7...they have caprinhas at noon and don't stop till late) we settled on ordering pizza. We got into a little tiff - I was like, I didn't come all the way from NYC to have pizza in brazil which they claim is fantastic and better than NYC pizza...the crew was relentless, so I had to settle (don't worry fascatis...I still got your back). Dinner went late into the evening after which the parents and danielle retired....without going into too much detail, the rest of the youngins, including myself, took part in some illicit activities which apparently were shipped all the way from Sao Paolo under cover of paper bags and saran wrap...supposedly high quality stuff so i was feeling pretty good...in any event....i walked the streets I used to roam (coldplay reference) late that night and managed to find my why home...to the dismay of my parents and our host families.....until next time.

Picture time

We also went to waterfalls yesterday, and Aaron and the boys went down the "rock" slide. Aaron's a bit concerned he can't have babies...I told him he'll be fine.

We also got to drink directly out of coconuts. Yummy!

Day 1/Day2

So we got to Philly international airport, checked in...the woman at the counter took forever...similar to the SNL episodes. But it was all good. Then we sat in our terminal for a bit, relaxed, had something to eat, and drink, and our flight slowly got delayed more and more. Eventually it hit us that we were going to miss our layover in Miami, and thus would not make it to Sao Palo. So we left the terminal, went back downstairs to check in(because of course American Airlines has a policy to not have representatives at the gate, or in the terminal for that matter). They told us the next flight wasn't until the following day, and we would not make it to Brazil until Sunday. Well...when traveling with Greens, most of you know, we don't take no for an answer. So mom played good cop(i know, surprising, right?), and after about 45 minutes, we got the dude to put us on a Continental flight that was departing in 3 hours. Yeah, seemed ideal, right? It was even direct! Okay, so the setback was...our direct flight was departing from Newark NJ, which is about 2 hrs from philly, when there's no traffic. Man, we rushed our toushies. We had a nice cab service drive us to newark, we put no pressure on him, but let him know if he didn't get us to te airport by 8, we were screwed...so we drove fast, got there with 5 minutes to spare, and got the last 4 seats on the flight. Yeah...we were assigned middle seats...except for Aaron, because he has -elite- status. yeah, whatever, i know, he must have kicked some poor old lady out of her spot just so he could get a window.

Okay, so we arrived to Paraty, beautiful and scenic drive. We are staying in two homes. One happens to be the home of the Portugese royal family. They have pictures of themselves all over their walls, it's a bit creepy, but they have a gorgeous garden, and a beautful beach front view, which should be fabulous for new years firework watching. We are staying in another home that is more modern, with an unbelievable garden and pool. We'll post pictures later, as soon as we figure out how technology works.

Today we took a boat and traveled around paradise. We jumped out of the boat into the bay and swam. The water was warm, and clear. We saw amazing schools of yellow and black fish, and also saw a ginormous lizard. We pulled up at bloody mary's beach headquarters for lunch, had passion fruit caprinias and fresh fish. We''ll make you all this drink at our party...that we'll host one day, it's that fantastic, and they also had their sugar cane alcohol in the drink, which can be substitued with Vodka!

Alright, gotta go to find more liquor. (yeah, that's how the green family roles...righghght?)

Still In Philly

"it's not a vacation if we're not in a fight yet." (says Aaron)

Mom is screaming at dad, and danielle screaming at Aaron...vacation has begun.

So our Limo should arrive at 4:00 PM sharp, mom will be stressed...dad will almost forget the visas, and if we're lucky, dad's eye glasses won't get run over this time ;)

Alright, we'll keep you posted on our Brazilian Adventure, so check daily.  We'll even post photos if dad learns how.