Bonito

bonito means beautiful in portugese. as a town, it is not so beautiful but there are lots of beautiful things to see and do within a few kms from town.

We are staying at the HI Bonito Hostel. It has AC (praise the lord!), a pool, and accepts credit cards. Breakfast is included in the price and was pretty nice this morning. The room is clean and comfy, it is sooo nice after being in the Pantanhal. Its like being in a resort.

We went snorkeling in the Barra of Sucuri River. They had all the equipment we needed and gave us wet suits. The water was so refreshing! It was my first time snorkeling and it was very enjoyable -- although our guide did not speak English, we played the ´follow the leader´game. (We watched what the Brazilians did, and then copied them.) After we had all of our gear on, we paddled upstream against the current. There were 7 of us and the guide, only 3 of us apparently knew how to paddle. The two ladies didnt even attempt to try paddling from what Mike and I saw. Good thing Mike and I were along to carry these folks upstream. We then got out of the boat and just floated down and soaked it all in. All you hear when snorkeling is the sounds you make, everything else is silenced by the water. As I never understand what people are saying here, it was nice to have a different kind of silence. We did not get to see millions of fish -- just four varities, but they were plentiful and quite large. I was also able to enjoy the different vegetation as we floated down stream.

Our second day tour was of waterfalls. We saw 7 waterfalls, ranging in size and shape. We got to go swimming in 5 of them. The first one is pretty and scenic and we got some great shots. It proceeded to start raining after the 2nd one and rained most of the rest of the tour, so we dont have as many pictures of the later ones since we put the camera away to protect it. One waterfall had a small cave you could swim into after you passed under it which was fun. Since it was raining, we got to see the rain dripping on the stalactites. There was also a waterfall and a place to jump off -- I am way too chicken for that sort of thing. They are very concerned about preserving the ecology of the area (which is wonderful) and that was why we were not allowed to climb around on everything and go in every waterfall. It was a great fun day -- and the rain probably made for better views of the waterfall.