going to Petropolis

In a nutshell, Petropolis is the summer place created by Pedro I and Pedro II, former rulers of Brazil in the 1800's. It is close to 800 m (2400 ft) above sea level, making it cooler than Rio, just a little over an hour away... if you don't get lost in the way...

The drive is around a mountain covered in green, jungle like plants.We even saw a sign warning about monkeys jumping into the road! Every now and then we saw people selling things they make or fruits and food. The view is great, once you reach the top you can see a set of mountains, a

flock of large birds, and the winding roads full of cars, everything else is green.

Petropolis is a very busy small city, spread out around the mountain, with German style houses built a long time ago. Being an old town, the streets are narrow and crowded, some are cobblestone and they are all twisted and crooked, wrapped around the mountain, going up and down.

Again, we took a wrong turn and ended up in "Rua Santa Teresa" instead of downtown, but this was a fortunate turn of events because we wouldn't have known about this otherwise. Santa Teresa is one

of the busiest places I have ever seen, and you can trust me on this one! It's about 2 km of shop after shop, one right next to the other and thousands of people shopping, carrying very large bags full of things. People go around in their tennis shoes, busily searching for the best prices (I saw VERY good ones) and offers, sometimes flooding the street where vendors, cyclists and cars go about as well.

We didn't stop,but that will certainly be a place I'm going back to, although I need to go with girlfriends instead of kids!!! Anyone want to join me?, I can't go there alone :-D!!!!!

We were lucky to find a spot to park, accross the street from the Imperial Museum. I went to stand in line, a long and slow one, while Fernando took the kids to watch some kind of street dance. Once we

reached the front of the line, and to my dismay, I barely understood that the tickets were not sold there, but at a booth!!! Fernando and the kids ran there, but had to stand in a line there as well and I had to go back to the end of the line!!!!!! I was upset about that one!!!!!!

The visit went well, nice summer house, and lots of paintings and stuff (check out the link I posted).

Once outside, while we were taking pictures, a group of teenagers came to talk to us. People are really

friendly and curious when they hear us talking in English or Spanish. It was a group coming from another

city, 4 hours away. they asked us if they could take a picture with us- well, with our kids to be precise-

and were so happy when we did! they also asked Eric " voce tein uma enamorada?" (do you have a girlfriend?)...

o.k. so, girls here don't beat around the bushes, huh? Eric and Alan were really happy about this!

We love our day trip and said we'll be back, we didn't have a chance to see many other things, and

we will bring our guests here!